The Impact of Education on Intergroup Attitudes

Abstract

How does education affect racial attitudes? Past studies focus almost exclusively on Whites’ attitudes toward Blacks, neglecting important minority populations. This study extends previous research by analyzing the effects of education on beliefs about racial stereotypes, discrimination, and affirmative action policies among Whites, Asians, Hispanics, and Blacks. Results indicate that Whites, Hispanics, and Blacks with higher levels of education are more likely to reject negative stereotypes, but these effects are less consistent among Asians. And, although education has consistent positive effects on awareness of discrimination against minorities, a more advanced education is not associated with greater support for racial preferences among any respondent group. Education is, however, related to more favorable attitudes toward race-targeted job training. These results are partly consistent with a revised group conflict perspective positing that education unevenly promotes different elements of the dominant racial ideology among nonwhite minorities, depending on their position in the racial hierarchy.

Are Smart People Less Racist? Verbal Ability, Anti-Black Prejudice, and the Principle-Policy Paradox

“…For example, a large body of evidence indicates that, compared to whites with lower levels of education, highly educated whites are more likely to reject negative stereotypes, to endorse norms of racial equality, and to accept racial integration in principle, but are no more likely to support affirmative action policies (Glaser 2001; Jackman 1978, 1994, 1996; Jackman and Muha 1984; Schaefer 1996; Schuman et al 1997; Wodtke 2012). Although education and cognitive ability are closely related, they are fundamentally distinct concepts with unique and separable effects on intergroup attitudes (Bobo and Licari 1989; Hodson and Busseri 2012; Kanazawa 2010).…”

Education and Universalism in Europe: When Education Supports Democracy

“…Nonetheless, Rational Choice scholars attribute values, norms, opinions and attitudes to the material interests connected to social positions of individuals, not to scholastic socialisation: high education would not guarantee the openness of mind. According to these scholars, if researchers considered interviewees' social class, the effect exercised by education on removal of prejudices and recognition of the other would disappear or would be very weak (Malchow-Møller et al 2006, Wodtke 2012.…”

“…Nowadays, though, the scholars who follow the Rational Choice theory challenge such an optimist approach, highlighting how the possession of a high level of education does not lead to greater mind-openness. According to them, education does not free individuals from the specific social position they occupy and from the interests associated with them (Wodtke 2012).…”

Social Identity and Attitudes toward HIV Pre-exposure Prophylaxis: A Structural Equation Model

“…In the present experimental study, this finding was not replicated and Hypothesis 4 was thus only partially supported. This could be attributed to the nature of this sample consisting of university students who are known to express less prejudice than other groups (Wodtke, 2012). Furthermore, given that HIV is especially associated with gay men and Black Africans in public consciousness, it is possible that participants perceived PrEP to be most advantageous for these communities and, thus, endorsed it when these groups were represented as primary beneficiaries.…”