Thanks for asking: Self-affirming questions reduce backlash when stigmatized targets confront prejudice

Stone, Jeff; Whitehead, Jessica; Schmader, Toni; Focella, Elizabeth S.

doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2010.12.016

Cited by 62 publications

(80 citation statements)

References 40 publications

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“…To reduce threat, an intervention must focus on a specific aspect of identity unrelated to the domain of threat (Sherman & Cohen, 2006). Thus, by recalling a time they acted fairly or were creative (Stone, Whitehead, Schmader, & Focella, 2011), negotiators could diminish the threat posed by women who negotiate well. In addition, writing about a cherished personal value reduces bias following threat (Rudman, Dohn, & Fairchild, 2007), and describing an important group membership operates similarly (McGregor, Haji, & Kang, 2008).…”

Section: Instill Norms To Minimize Identity Threatmentioning

confidence: 99%

A pawn in someone else's game?: The cognitive, motivational, and paradigmatic barriers to women's excelling in negotiation

Kennedy

Kray

2015

Research in Organizational Behavior

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Within a framework of inequality the existence of conflict is denied and the means to engage openly in conflict are excluded. -Jean Baker Miller, M. D. The New Psychology of WomenWomen in organizations are succeeding to a lesser degree than men. Women still hold only 5% of CEO positions (Catalyst, 2015), 19% of Board Directorships (Catalyst, 2015 and are estimated to earn only $0.82 for every dollar paid to men (Hegewisch, Ellis, & Hartmann, 2015). When women are under-represented in high status positions, it becomes more difficult for other women to succeed in the organization (Ibarra, 1992(Ibarra, , 1993Kanter, 1977). The female gender group is seen more negatively in firms with fewer senior women (Ely, 1994) and women's skills go unrecognized (Joshi, 2014) 1 .Despite similar career aspirations, the trajectories of high-achieving men and women in MBA programs vary in important ways. A recent survey of Harvard Business School alumni showed that women were less likely than men to hold senior management positions, less likely to Women's relatively worse performance in negotiation is often cited as an explanation for gender differences in advancement and pay within organizations. We review key findings from the past twenty years of research on gender differences in negotiation. Women do underperform relative to men in negotiation, but only under limited circumstances, which means the performance gap is unlikely due to lesser skills on their part. The barriers between women and negotiation excellence are of three types: cognitive, motivational, and paradigmatic. Cognitive barriers stem from negative stereotypes about women's negotiating abilities. Motivational barriers stem from desire to prevent women negotiators from excelling in a masculine domain. Paradigmatic barriers stem from how negotiation is currently studied. We call for greater attention to motivational barriers and for changes to the negotiation paradigm. Women negotiators are not incompetent, and training them to negotiate more like men is not obviously the solution. In fact, women have greater concern for others than men do, and their cooperativeness elevates collective intelligence and enables ethical behavior. Under a new paradigm of negotiation, the value of these strengths could become more readily apparent. In particular, we advocate for greater attention to long-term relationships, subjective value, and relational capital, all of which may have important economic implications in real world negotiations. ß

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Section: Instill Norms To Minimize Identity Threatmentioning

confidence: 99%

A pawn in someone else's game?: The cognitive, motivational, and paradigmatic barriers to women's excelling in negotiation

Kennedy

Kray

2015

Research in Organizational Behavior

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“…The workshop starts by carefully introducing students to the nature of intergroup bias. This is a delicate topic for many and research shows that confronting people right off the bat tends to cause anger and motivate resistance to the information 30–32 . Thus, the workshop begins with a broad discussion of the psychological building blocks of bias and how it impacts judgement and interaction.…”

Section: Training In Implicit Bias Can Enhance Cultural Competencementioning

confidence: 99%

Non-conscious bias in medical decision making: what can be done to reduce it?

2011

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Medical Education 2011: 45: 768–776 Context Non‐conscious stereotyping and prejudice contribute to racial and ethnic disparities in health care. Contemporary training in cultural competence is insufficient to reduce these problems because even educated, culturally sensitive, egalitarian individuals can activate and use their biases without being aware they are doing so. However, these problems can be reduced by workshops and learning modules that focus on the psychology of non‐conscious bias. The Psychology of NON‐Conscious Bias Research in social psychology shows that over time stereotypes and prejudices become invisible to those who rely on them. Automatic categorisation of an individual as a member of a social group can unconsciously trigger the thoughts (stereotypes) and feelings (prejudices) associated with that group, even if these reactions are explicitly denied and rejected. This implies that, when activated, implicit negative attitudes and stereotypes shape how medical professionals evaluate and interact with minority group patients. This creates differential diagnosis and treatment, makes minority group patients uncomfortable and discourages them from seeking or complying with treatment. Pitfalls in Cultural Competence Training Cultural competence training involves teaching students to use race and ethnicity to diagnose and treat minority group patients, but to avoid stereotyping them by over‐generalising cultural knowledge to individuals. However, the Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services (CLAS) standards do not specify how these goals should be accomplished and psychological research shows that common approaches like stereotype suppression are ineffective for reducing non‐conscious bias. To effectively address bias in health care, training in cultural competence should incorporate research on the psychology of non‐conscious stereotyping and prejudice. Training in Implicit Bias Enhances Cultural Competence Workshops or other learning modules that help medical professionals learn about non‐conscious processes can provide them with skills that reduce bias when they interact with minority group patients. Examples of such skills in action include automatically activating egalitarian goals, looking for common identities and counter‐stereotypical information, and taking the perspective of the minority group patient.

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“…Importantly, the affirming feedback was most effective for participants high in racial prejudice – those who may show the greatest anger and tendency to backlash when challenged by a stigmatized target. However, Stone and colleagues () note two important limitations to Sinclair and Kunda's () finding as a strategy for empowering targets. One is that in some contexts like a job interview, it would be inappropriate, and potentially risky, to positively complement a biased interviewer.…”

Section: Bias‐reduction Strategiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Nevertheless, it may be possible for a low‐status target to activate self‐affirmation processes in a highly biased perceiver, without raising suspicion, by asking self‐affirming questions. Stone and colleagues () included conditions in which prior to reading the perspective‐taking message, participants read a section on the Arab American student's webpage that asked questions designed to make positive self‐resources accessible (e.g., When were you creative?). The results showed that when the self‐affirming questions appeared before the perspective‐taking message, highly prejudiced individuals formed more positive impressions of the target, compared with the control conditions in which the target did not use a bias‐reduction strategy, in part because high‐prejudice participants did not perceive his statement to be confrontational or stereotypic of the group.…”

Section: Bias‐reduction Strategiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Finally, targets may have more success using blatant, confrontational types of strategies, if they first use a strategy that reduces the threat that highly prejudiced individuals feel during an intergroup interaction. For example, Stone and colleagues () found that if a target asked self‐affirming questions prior to delivering a confrontational perspective‐taking message, highly prejudiced participants formed more positive impressions of the target, compared with when the target only presented the confrontational message or did not use a bias‐reduction strategy. Whitehead (2011) similarly found that men formed more positive impressions of a woman if she asked self‐affirming questions before presenting her counterstereotypic attributes.…”

Section: Expanding the Toolkit: Directions For Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Confrontation and Beyond: Examining a Stigmatized Target's Use of a Prejudice Reduction Strategy

Focella

Bean

Stone

2015

Social & Personality Psych

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What can stigmatized individuals do to reduce stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination when they interact with a biased individual? This paper reviews the social psychological literature that examines how targets can be active agents of prejudice reduction for themselves and their group. The extant literature indicates that a target's direct confrontation of bias can reduce prejudice and discrimination against the target's group but that this strategy can also backlash in the form of increased prejudice and discrimination against the target. Other research indicates that presenting a common‐identity, self‐enhancing feedback, and a self‐affirmation can reduce bias against the target but that they may not reliably change bias against the target's group. We conclude by discussing the need for research on the processes by which stigmatized targets decide to use a given bias‐reduction strategy and on the processes by which specific strategies are effective, either alone or in combination, when delivered by a stigmatized target.

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Thanks for asking: Self-affirming questions reduce backlash when stigmatized targets confront prejudice

Cited by 62 publications

References 40 publications

A pawn in someone else's game?: The cognitive, motivational, and paradigmatic barriers to women's excelling in negotiation

A pawn in someone else's game?: The cognitive, motivational, and paradigmatic barriers to women's excelling in negotiation

Non-conscious bias in medical decision making: what can be done to reduce it?

Confrontation and Beyond: Examining a Stigmatized Target's Use of a Prejudice Reduction Strategy

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