No abstract

In many Western countries, the proportion of the population that is White will drop below 50% within the next century. Two experiments examined how anticipation of these future ethnic demographics affects current intergroup processes. In Study 1, White Americans who viewed actual demographic projections for a time when Whites are no longer a numerical majority felt more angry toward and fearful of ethnic minorities than Whites who did not view future projections. Whites who viewed the future projections also felt more sympathy for their ingroup than Whites in the control condition. In Study 2, the authors replicated the effects for intergroup emotions with a sample of White Canadians. White Canadians who thought about a future in which Whites were a numerical minority appraised the ingroup as more threatened, which mediated the effect of condition on intergroup emotions. The authors discuss the implications of these findings for race relations in increasingly diverse societies.

Like other racial minority groups, multiracial people face discrimination as a function of their racial identity, and this discrimination represents a threat to psychological well-being. Following the Rejection-Identification Model (RIM; Branscombe, Schmitt, & Harvey, 1999), we argue that perceived discrimination will encourage multiracial people to identify more strongly with other multiracials, and that multiracial identification, in turn, fosters psychological well-being. Thus, multiracial identification is conceptualized as a coping response that reduces the overall costs of discrimination on well-being. This study is the first to test the RIM in a sample of multiracial people. Multiracial participants' perceptions of discrimination were negatively related to life satisfaction. Consistent with the RIM, perceived discrimination was positively related to three aspects of multiracial group identification: stereotyping the self as similar to other multiracial people, perceiving people within the multiracial category as more homogenous, and expressing solidarity with the multiracial category. Self-stereotyping was the only aspect of group identification that mediated a positive relationship between perceived discrimination and life satisfaction, suggesting that multiracial identification's protective properties rest in the fact that it provides an collective identity where one "fits."

Previous research has shown that one way for members of stigmatized groups to deal with the aversive experience of discrimination is by increasing group identification (Branscombe, Schmitt, & Harvey, 1999; Schmitt & Branscombe, 2002). Indeed, group identification can buffer the negative impact of discrimination on psychological well-being (Kertzner, Meyer, Frost, & Stirratt, 2009; Smith & Silva, 2011). In the present research we examine potential coping mechanisms through which identification with a stigmatized group increases psychological well-being. According to Social Identity Theory (SIT, Tajfel & Turner, 1979, 1986), members of stigmatized groups confronted with discrimination can try to cope by distancing themselves from the stigma

Drawing on social identity perspectives and theories concerning intergroup threat, we examined if heterosexual women’s support for two types of trans-inclusive bathroom legislation depended on whether they perceived trans women as a threat to women as a whole. Participants read about a hypothetical trans-inclusive bathroom bill that was either described as increasing public gender-neutral bathrooms or allowing trans women to access public women-only bathrooms. Surprisingly, bill support did not significantly differ across conditions. Consistent with predictions, intergroup threat was negatively associated with bill support and moderated the effect of bathroom bill type on bill support. Highly threatened women were significantly more supportive when the legislation was described as increasing gender-neutral bathrooms versus allowing trans women to use women-only bathrooms. Conversely, women who were not particularly threatened were significantly more supportive of the hypothetical legislation when it was described as allowing trans women to use women-only bathrooms.