When White Men Can't Do Math: Necessary and Sufficient Factors in Stereotype Threat

Aronson, Joshua; Lustina, Michael J.; Good, Catherine; Keough, Kelli A.; Steele, Claude M.; Brown, Joseph L.

doi:10.1006/jesp.1998.1371

Cited by 703 publications

(675 citation statements)

References 21 publications

(29 reference statements)

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“…That is, students who were more strongly identified with the school and who held stereotyped beliefs about the academic domains emphasized at the school may have been more negatively impacted by their stereotypical beliefs than students who were less strongly identified with the school. This finding parallels other research on the importance of domain identification on performance, such as findings from the stereotype threat literature indicating that individuals who are strongly identified with a particular domain show greater effects of stereotype threat on performance than individuals who are not identified with the domain (Aronson et al, 1999;Steele, 1997).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 69%

Student Characteristics Associated with Girls’ Success in a Single-sex School

Patterson

Pahlke

2010

Sex Roles

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Abstract:Given the mixed results of previous studies on the benefits of single-sex schooling, scholars have called for research on differences in the effects of single-sex schooling based on student and school characteristics. We sought to examine the associations of a range of student characteristics with attitudes and achievement among students attending an all-girls public middle school in the southwestern United States. Predictor variables included demographic factors (i.e., race, family income), prior academic achievement, gender stereotyping, and gender identity (i.e., gender typicality, peer preferences). Prior academic achievement predicted later achievement and persistence in the single-sex school. School-related stereotyping was associated with success in and connection to the single-sex school; school connection was also a significant moderator of the relation between stereotyping and academic performance. Gendertyped peer preferences were associated with school connection and persistence. Overall, results indicate that student characteristics, as well as issues of "fit" with the specific school, are associated with students' connection to and success in single-sex educational environments. . Student Characteristics Associated With Girls' Success in a Single-Sex School. Sex Roles, 65,[737][738][739][740][741][742][743][744][745][746][747][748][749][750]

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 69%

Student Characteristics Associated with Girls’ Success in a Single-sex School

Patterson

Pahlke

2010

Sex Roles

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“…However, for this study, a condition in which nothing was said about the stereotype condition was added, in which participants were not given any information about stereotypes. It was unclear whether simply working on the math-related task was enough to induce an implicit stereotype threat (e.g., Nosek, Banaji, & Greenwald, 2002;Smith & Johnson, 2006;Smith & White, 2002) or whether working on the task with no stereotype information would serve as a control condition (e.g., Aronson et al, 1999;Schmader & Johns, 2003).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The stereotyped task engagement process: The role of interest and achievement motivation.

Smith¹,

Sansone²,

White³

2007

Journal of Educational Psychology

136

126

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Competence-based stereotypes can negatively affect women's performance in math and science (referred to as stereotype threat), presumably leading to lower motivation. The authors examined the effects of stereotype threat on interest, a motivational path not necessarily mediated by performance. They predicted that working on a computer science task in the context of math-gender stereotypes would negatively affect undergraduate women's task interest, particularly for those higher in achievement motivation who were hypothesized to hold performance-avoidance goals in response to the threat. Compared with when the stereotype was nullified, while under stereotype threat an assigned performance-avoidance (vs. -approach) goal was associated with lower interest for women higher in achievement motivation (Study 1), and women higher (vs. lower) in achievement motivation were more likely to spontaneously adopt performance-avoidance goals (Study 2). The motivational influence of performance-avoidance goals under stereotype threat was primarily mediated by task absorption (Study 3). Implications for the stereotyped task engagement process (Smith, 2004) are discussed.Keywords: achievement motivation, achievement goals, motivation, stereotype threat, gender Women continue to be less likely to select and persist in science, mathematics, and related fields despite gains in preparation and increased requirements for both girls and boys prior to college. A number of hypotheses have been proposed as to why these gender differences occur, including both biological limitations and socialization pressures (e.g., Eccles, Adler, & Meece, 1984). The focus of our research is on the role competence-based stereotypes may play. Whether or not there are real intrinsic ability differences between men and women in math and science (e.g., Benbow & Stanley, 1980;Mullis et al., 1998;Spelke, 2005), stereotypes about these differences exist and are frequently made salient (e.g., comments by Summers, as cited in the Harvard Crimson, 2005). 1 The stereotype threat literature is centered on the finding that awareness of a competence-related stereotype can, in and of itself, lead to poorer task performance (e.g., Smith & White, 2002;Spencer, Steele, & Quinn, 1999;C. M. Steele & Aronson, 1995;Yopyk & Prentice, 2005; see also Wicherts, Dolan, & Hessen, 2005). Members of stereotyped groups feel threatened because their performance may confirm to themselves, other people, or both the negative performance expectations about the group. The resulting negative effects on performance can occur even when women report that they do not believe the stereotypes are true (cf. Schmader, Johns, & Barquissau, 2004).As illustrated on the left side of Figure 1, the stereotype-performance path suggests negative competence-based stereotypes associated with women in math and science lead directly to an impairment of their performance (e.g., Shih, Pittinsky, & Ambady, 1999;Smith & White, 2002;Spencer et al., 1999), which, in turn, negatively affect their likelihood of selecti...

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“…Stereotype threat is thought to be activated by situational cues (henceforth "primes") that remind individuals that their group is negatively stereotyped (Aronson et al 1999). These reminders lead to negative performance via several mechanisms (Pennington et al 2016;Schmader and Johns 2003), such as depleting working memory (Schmader, Johns, and Forbes 2008) or increasing mental load (Croizet et al 2004).…”

Section: Theoretical Framework: Stereotype Threatmentioning

confidence: 99%

Stereotype Threat and Educational Tracking: A Field Experiment in Chinese Vocational High Schools

Chu

Loyalka

et al. 2018

Socius

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Educational tracks create differential expectations of student ability, raising concerns that the negative stereotypes associated with lower tracks might threaten student performance. The authors test this concern by drawing on a field experiment enrolling 11,624 Chinese vocational high school students, half of whom were randomly primed about their tracks before taking technical skill and math exams. As in almost all countries, Chinese students are sorted between vocational and academic tracks, and vocational students are stereotyped as having poor academic abilities. Priming had no effect on technical skills and, contrary to hypotheses, modestly improved math performance. In exploring multiple interpretations, the authors highlight how vocational tracking may crystallize stereotypes but simultaneously diminishes stereotype threat by removing academic performance as a central measure of merit. Taken together, the study implies that reminding students about their vocational or academic identities is unlikely to further contribute to achievement gaps by educational track.

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When White Men Can't Do Math: Necessary and Sufficient Factors in Stereotype Threat

Cited by 703 publications

References 21 publications

Student Characteristics Associated with Girls’ Success in a Single-sex School

Student Characteristics Associated with Girls’ Success in a Single-sex School

The stereotyped task engagement process: The role of interest and achievement motivation.

Stereotype Threat and Educational Tracking: A Field Experiment in Chinese Vocational High Schools

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