Folk Beliefs About Human Genetic Variation Predict Discrete Versus Continuous Racial Categorization and Evaluative Bias

Plaks, Jason E.; Malahy, Lori Wu; Sedlins, Mara; Shoda, Yuichi

doi:10.1177/1948550611408118

Cited by 52 publications

(56 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…Knowles & peng, 2005) or people rely on other cues, such as the stereotypicality of clothing (freeman, penner, Saperstein, Scheutz, & ambady, 2011) to help guide racial categorization. recent research has highlighted how a number of different social motivations can influence racial categorization of ambiguous and multiracial targets, including physical threat (Miller, Maner, & Becker, 2010), economic scarcity (Krosch & amodio, 2014;rodenheffer, hill, & lord, 2012), essentialism (chao, hong, & chiu, 2013;plaks, Malahy, Sedlins, & Shoda, 2012), and ideological motives (gaither, 2015;Krosch, Berntsen, amodio, Jost, & van Bavel, 2013;Kteily, cotterill, Sidanius, Sheehy-Skeffington, & Bergh, 2014). here, we expand on this prior research and examine the impact of two related social motives-belonging needs and racial identification-on the categorization of racially ambiguous targets.…”

Section: Categorization Of Racially Ambiguous Targetsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Belonging Motivates Categorization of Racially Ambiguous Faces

Gaither¹,

Pauker²,

Slepian³

et al. 2016

Social Cognition

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Categorizing racially ambiguous individuals is multifaceted, and the current work proposes social-motivational factors also exert considerable influence on how racial ambiguity is perceived, directing the resolution of ambiguity in a manner that is functionally beneficial to the perceiver. Four studies tested two motivations related to social belonging: belonging needs and racial identification. Greater need to belong and racial identification (Study 1), and two types of social belonging threats-social exclusion (Studies 2a and 2b) and racial identity threat (Study 3)-predicted more categorizations of racially ambiguous Black/White faces as Black, with White participants more likely to categorize ambiguous faces as outgroup members (i.e., Black; Studies 1, 2a, 2b, and 3) and Black participants more likely to categorize ambiguous faces as ingroup members (Study 2b). Results also demonstrated that self-affirmation mitigated this motivated categorization for Whites (Study 3), illustrating the malleability of social categorization and its dependency on serving self-relevant goals.

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Section: Categorization Of Racially Ambiguous Targetsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Belonging Motivates Categorization of Racially Ambiguous Faces

Gaither¹,

Pauker²,

Slepian³

et al. 2016

Social Cognition

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Other experiments have found that manipulating racial bias leads to changes in essentialist thinking about race (Morton et al, ). Yet, unlike previous experiments (Andreychik & Gill, ; Chao et al, ; Kang et al, ; Kimel et al, ; Morton et al, ; Plaks et al, ), this study did not manipulate exposure to information about genetic variation or racial bias. Rather, it measured these variables.…”

Section: Mechanistic Limitations In the Present Experimentsmentioning

confidence: 88%

“…Prior experiments have shown that manipulating perceptions of genetic variation between racial or ethnic groups can cause changes in a variety of social‐psychological phenomena such as, racial bias (Andreychik & Gill, ; Kang et al, ; Plaks et al, ), inter‐ethnic hostility (Kimel, Huesmann, Kunst, & Halperin, ), and racial categorization (Chao et al, ). Other experiments have found that manipulating racial bias leads to changes in essentialist thinking about race (Morton et al, ).…”

Section: Mechanistic Limitations In the Present Experimentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Several studies support this claim. For example, experiments by Kang, Plaks, and Remedios (2015) and Plaks, Malahy, Sedlins, and Shoda (2012) show that manipulating beliefs about the genetic similarity of racial groups affects levels of implicit racial bias. Likewise, an experiment by Keller (2005) demonstrated that levels of prejudice can be manipulated by activating the belief that ethnic groups differ genetically.…”

Section: Essentialism and Prejudicementioning

confidence: 99%

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Learned inequality: Racial labels in the biology curriculum can affect the development of racial prejudice

Donovan

2016

J Res Sci Teach

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For over a century, genetic arguments for the existence of racial inequality have been used to oppose policies that promote social equality. And, over that same time period, American biology textbooks have repeatedly discussed genetic differences between races. This experiment tests whether racial terminology in the biology curriculum causes adolescents to develop genetic beliefs about racial difference, thereby affecting prejudice. Individual students (N = 135, grades 7–9) were randomly assigned within their classrooms to learn either from: (i) four text‐based lessons discussing racial differences in skeletal structure and the prevalence of genetic disease (racial condition); or (ii) an identical curriculum lacking racial terminology (nonracial condition). Over 3‐months that coincided with this learning, students in the racial condition grew significantly more in their perception of the amount of genetic variation between races relative to students in the nonracial condition. Furthermore, those in the racial condition grew in their belief that races differ in intelligence for genetic reasons significantly more than those in the nonracial condition. And, compared to the nonracial condition, students in the racial condition became significantly less interested in socializing across racial lines and less supportive of policies that reduce racial inequality in education. These findings show how biology education sustains racial inequality, and conversely, how human genetic variation education could be designed to reduce genetically based racism. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 54: 379–411, 2017

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“…People hold the ories about seemingly everything, including genetics (Plaks, Malahy, Sedlins, & Shoda, 2012), global warming (Dunlap, 1998), and obesity (McFerran & Mukhopadhyay, 2013). Some of these theories apply to people's own selves, including lay theories about willpower (Job, Walton, Bernecker, & Dweck, 2013;Miller et al, 2012), personality traits (Beer, 2002), and moods (Igou, 2004).…”

Section: Lay Theoriesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Holding a silver lining theory: When negative attributes heighten performance

Wesnousky

Oettingen

Gollwitzer

2015

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology

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• Silver lining lay theories are prevalent and spontaneously generated.• For people induced with impulsivity, a silver lining theory heightens creativity.• Holding a silver lining theory increases effort invested in performance. a b s t r a c t a r t i c l e i n f o Keywords: Self-concept Lay theory Self-regulation Impulsivity Creativity Silver lining theory Holding a lay theory that a negative personal attribute is associated with a positive attribute (i.e., a silver lining theory), may increase effortful performance in the domain of the positive attribute. In Study 1, individuals readily generated personal silver lining theories when prompted to consider a negative attribute, and the majority of in dividuals endorsed them for themselves. In Studies 2 and 3, we investigated how believing in a silver lining the ory affected performance using the specific silver lining theory that impulsivity was associated with creativity. In both a college (Study 2) and an online sample (Study 3), individuals induced to believe that they were impulsive and then given the specific silver lining theory that impulsivity was related to creativity showed greater effort based creativity than those for whom the silver lining theory was refuted. In Study 4, individuals made to believe that they were impulsive and given the silver lining theory performed more creatively than those who received no information about a silver lining theory, indicating that the silver lining theory increased performance relative to baseline. Silver lining lay theories may allow people to compensate for a negative attribute by promoting ef fortful behavior in the domain of a positive attribute believed to be linked to that negative attribute.

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Folk Beliefs About Human Genetic Variation Predict Discrete Versus Continuous Racial Categorization and Evaluative Bias

Cited by 52 publications

References 44 publications

Social Belonging Motivates Categorization of Racially Ambiguous Faces

Social Belonging Motivates Categorization of Racially Ambiguous Faces

Learned inequality: Racial labels in the biology curriculum can affect the development of racial prejudice

Holding a silver lining theory: When negative attributes heighten performance

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