As students participate in diversity courses in greater numbers, it is important to understand the effects of these courses. Although other researchers have examined this topic, particularly with respect to stereotype reduction and racial attitudes, we were interested in how a diversity course might also affect students' awareness of racism and White privilege. With both quantitative and qualitative measures, our results showed increases in awareness and in feelings of racial guilt and responsibility. These findings expand the existing literature and highlight important questions for future research.
What happens when a diversity class is over? How does awareness change during the course of the subsequent year?Only a handful of studies have addressed this question, and none has done so by examining the same participants before the class starts, when it is finished, and 1 year later. Our findings showed that although students' awareness and attitudes shifted during a diversity course in psychology (as has been previously shown), some of the changes appear to plateau or even wane in the intervening year. Encouragingly, this is balanced by increased feelings of comfort with racial issues and an apparent increase in interaction with those of other races.
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