Stereotype III Flashcards
What is stereotype threat?
The concern experience by a person when there is a possibility that they may act in a way consistent with negative stereotypes
Affects performance on stereotyped task
Outline Steele and Aronson’s findings on stereotype threat
Black PPs performed worse than white PPs on a test presented as a measure of their intellectual ability, but performed equally well when no reference was made to intellectual ability
Outline stereotype threat research on gender
Women performed worse than men on a maths test when told it reveals gender differences
Performed equally well when told that it doesn’t
Outline Frantz et al.’s research on white American psychology UGs
White Americans are negatively stereotyped as racist using IAT
PPs completed IAT in explicit threat (aware it measures racial attitude), no threat (masked purpose of IAT), and no instruction (told it was a challenging task and to try hard)
IAT effect highest in explicit threat condition, second highest in no instruction and lowest when it was no threat
Outline the ‘leaky pipeline’ problem
An increasing loss of women up the career ladder within STEM subjects
Efforts to plug the leak include:
-Government: 2013 Science and Technology Select Committee Inquiry
-Universities: Athena Swan Award
Outline Davies et al.’s research on women’s career aspirations
Women exposed to gender-stereotypic TV ads reported less interest in pursuing qualifications or careers in fields involving quantitative skills
Outline Rydell, Rydell and Boucher’s research on stereotype threat
Females under stereotype threat showed attenuated learning of maths rules learnt under threat, compared to females not exposed to threat
Ways of reducing stereotype threat
Reframing and reappraisal: tests are reframed as a challenging learning experience, and also reduced when anxiety is presented as helpful rather than harmful to performance
De-emphasis of threatened social identity or domain: reduced when PPs given opportunity to list -ve and +ve attributes that describe their personal rather than social identity
What is values affirmation?
A psychological intervention that asks people to reflect on self-defining values.
How could V-A work to reduce stereotype threat?
Reflecting on self-defining values can provide a psychological buffer against threats to their personal integrity of self worth.
Outline the methods and results of Miyake et al.’s research
Men and women on an introductory physics course, completed intervention twice during a semester
Values-affirmation group: choose most important values and write about why it is important to you
Control group: choose least important values and write about why tit is important to others
Men’s results had no significant difference
Women’s results had a significant difference when presented with values-affirmation task.
