Differing Opportunity
On the relationship between indirect measures of Black versus White racial attitudes and discriminatory outcomes: An adversarial collaboration using a sample of White Americans
Jordan Axt et al.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
The idea that racial prejudice contributes to discrimination not only deliberately but also in a more automatic fashion has been one of the most prominent topics in social psychological research in the past 30 years. Much of the evidence for theories of automatic prejudice stems from the use of indirect measures of implicit attitudes, yet meta-analyses give differing estimates regarding the predictive validity of such measures. The present adversarial collaboration provides a test of the relationships between prominent measures of implicit racial attitudes and discriminatory behavior using a set of established lab-based paradigms among a sample of White Americans (N = 2,114). Using structural equation models that can account for measurement error, frequentist and Bayesian multiverse analyses confirmed that White Americans’ performance on indirect measures correlate modestly with these behavioral outcomes, and explain unique variance (∼2.5%) beyond direct, self-report measures of racial attitudes. At the same time, self-report measures exhibited greater predictive and incremental validity than indirect measures (explaining ∼45% of the variance) despite behavioral measures of discrimination displaying weak internal reliability. Results provided some support for greater predictive and incremental validity for indirect measures among participants scoring relatively low on measures of executive function and motivation to control prejudice. These results lend themselves to both relatively optimistic and pessimistic interpretations concerning scientific and practical significance. All collaborators agree that the best path forward is collaborative and focused on the generalizability of implicit racial attitudes to high-accountability organizational settings.
Job Search, Job Amenities and the Gender Pay Gap
Jason Faberman, Andreas Mueller & Ayşegül Şahin
NBER Working Paper, February 2026
Abstract:
This paper studies gender gaps in labor-market outcomes, with a focus on job ladder dynamics. We show that women experience substantially lower wage growth conditional on prior wages despite nearly identical job-to-job transition rates for men and women. To reconcile these observations, we document gender differences in the valuation of nonwage job amenities and in job search behavior, and develop a multi-dimensional job-ladder model with endogenous search effort where workers value both wages and amenities. The model allows for gender heterogeneity in separation rates, search effort, the value of nonemployment, amenity valuations, and bargaining power, enabling a joint analysis of gender wage and employment gaps. A quantitative decomposition shows that differences in preferences for nonwage amenities account for nearly 40 percent of the gender pay gap. Differences in the value of nonemployment and bargaining power explain most of the remainder, with only a limited role for differences in separation rates and search behavior. Finally, we show that increases in job amenities -- such as the expansion of remote work -- raise the gender wage gap while reducing gender differences in employment.
First Impressions Matter: Evidence from Elementary School Teachers
Marcos Rangel & Ying Shi
Journal of Human Resources, January 2026, Pages 123-159
Abstract:
We study the empirical relevance of first impressions in the context of education. We find that teachers who begin their careers in classrooms with large White–Black incoming score differentials carry negative views into evaluations of future cohorts of Black students relative to their White classmates. Our evidence is based on novel data on blind-scored evaluations and nonblind public school teacher assessments of fourth- and fifth-graders in North Carolina. Teachers’ perceptions are particularly sensitive to early classrooms with relatively low-performing Black students, but not to those with relatively high-performing Black students. Since teacher expectations can shape grading patterns and sorting into academic tracks, as well as students’ own beliefs and behaviors, these findings suggest an important link between specific teachers’ novice experiences and the persistence of racial gaps in educational attainment and achievement.
The Vietnam War and Racial Integration
Zachary Bleemer
NBER Working Paper, February 2026
Abstract:
The Vietnam draft conscripted hundreds of thousands of young Americans into an integrated military. I combine near-random draft lottery variation with administrative voter data to study the long-run racial integration effects of coerced national service. Black and Native American veterans became more likely to marry white spouses, identify as Republicans, and live in more-integrated neighborhoods. Improved economic standing may partly mediate these effects. Effects are larger for Southerners and are precisely null for white veterans. Coerced military service generates substantial but asymmetric cross-racial political convergence and racial integration: Vietnam-era service caused about 20 percent of affected cohorts' interracial marriages.
Progress or Backsliding? Changes in the Gender Wage Gap for Business Professionals
Ann Harrison, Laura Kray & Noor Sethi
NBER Working Paper, February 2026
Abstract:
In the United States, much of the gap in earnings between men and women is due to the persistent gap for high wage earners. This paper explores changes in the gender wage gap for MBAs graduating from a large public university over 30 years. We document large gender wage gaps on average, which grow in the course of men’s and women’s careers. Comparing graduates at identical career stages across time periods to address composition concerns, we show that the raw gender wage gap has shrunk by 33 to 50 percent over the last two decades. Additionally, the temporal pattern of the gap has fundamentally shifted: while gaps only emerged over time in earlier decades, significant gaps now emerge immediately. Convergence in labor supply factors, particularly hours worked, explains much of the narrowing gap, alongside shifts in industry composition. However, unexplained wage gaps persist for recent graduates from the very start of their careers, suggesting different underlying mechanisms across cohorts. These findings highlight both progress in gender wage equity among business professionals and concerning patterns that emerge earlier in careers than in previous decades.
Femininity culture: Theory and workplace implications
Andrea Vial & Marta Beneda
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Prior research on the psychological mechanisms that sustain gender employment segregation has examined the spillover of masculine gender role norms into organizational norms in male-typed fields. We expand this theoretical lens to examine the spillover of feminine gender role norms into organizational norms in female-typed fields, introducing the Femininity Workplace Culture construct. We theorize and demonstrate empirically that femininity workplace culture is ambivalent in nature. It reflects not only prescriptive feminine norms encouraging communality, as commonly assumed, but also proscriptive norms discouraging agency that produce normative pressures toward unmitigated communion. Across two pilots and five studies with over 5,000 respondents from diverse occupations, we found two distinct dimensions of femininity workplace culture, one tapping communal norms and the other tapping unmitigated communion norms, which distinguish workers in female-typed industries from workers in other industries. Femininity workplace culture’s ambivalent nature was also reflected in its nomological network: While the communal norms dimension is associated with positive psychological and work-related outcomes (e.g., affective well-being, job satisfaction), the unmitigated communion norms dimension is associated with negative outcomes (e.g., burnout, turnover intentions). These findings open promising avenues for future research into how femininity workplace culture shapes employee well-being and contributes to gender segregation in female-typed occupations.
Gender differences in choosing fast and slow: Evidence from competitive powerlifting
Scott Abrahams
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, March 2026
Abstract:
I examine decision-making across a gradient of time horizons using data from competitive powerlifting, where participants must assess their physical abilities under varying time constraints. Analyzing one million choice sequences in this natural, high-stakes setting, I document systematic gender differences that vary by horizon and feedback direction. Over horizons of thirty minutes to several hours, men consistently overestimate their abilities, failing initial attempts at all three types of lifts, and they are less likely to update sufficiently across lift types following the negative signal of an earlier miss. Under extreme time pressure requiring a decision within one minute, the performance gap shrinks and men are more likely to make beneficial deviations from established guidance. This differential rapid evaluation of the signal content in negative feedback suggests a novel explanatory mechanism for observed gender variation in performance under time pressure.
Do Hot Flashes Get the Cold Shoulder? Menopausal Symptoms and Disclosure Influence Leader Ratings
Alicia Grandey et al.
Journal of Business and Psychology, February 2026, Pages 27-45
Abstract:
Middle-aged working women may be poised to enter leadership roles at the same time they enter the menopausal transition. Unfortunately, menopause is assumed to evoke stigma and bias work judgments; however, this assumption is untested. We apply the stigma process model (Link & Phelan, 2001) to predict that if menopause carries stigma, identifying a woman as menopausal constrains her from leadership due to unfavorable stereotypes. In Study 1, three workplace meeting scenarios manipulated menopausal identification: a middle-aged woman without symptoms, with prototypical “hot flash” symptoms, and with symptoms disclosed as menopausal. As expected, hot flash symptoms reduced leader potential ratings due to lower judgments of her agency compared to no symptoms and increased the gender disparity in leader ratings. Unexpectedly, disclosing the symptoms as menopausal increased agency and leader potential ratings compared unlabeled symptoms. Study 2 offered a constructive replication and explored different explanations for this finding. Disclosure functioned as a compensatory agentic act, overriding the low agency stereotype; simply identifying her symptoms as menopausal did not have the same benefit. Participant gender and gender context ratio did not change these conclusions. We conclude that hot flash symptoms carry physical stigma that biases decisions and contributes to gender disparities, but disclosing they are menopausal overrides the costs, offering practical advice for midlife working women who seek career advancement.