Contesting Stereotypes and Creating Identities: Social Categories, Social Identities, and Educational Participation

Chapter 5. Social Identity, Stereotype Threat, and Self-Theories

Chapter 5 Social Identity, Stereotype Threat, and Self-Theories Catherine Good, Carol S. Dweck, and Joshua Aronson E ach of us possesses multiple social identities. For example, our sex, age, race, social class, religion, political beliefs, and professions are all potential social identities. In certain contexts in which we find ourselves, that social identity may be devalued. For example , Democrats at the Republican National Convention, gays and lesbians at a custody hearing, a lone woman at a corporate board of directors meeting, black people in an all-white, southern neighborhood , or an Arab flight attendant with an American or European airline —all are at risk of having a component of their social identities devalued in the respective contexts. In response to this devaluation, they may find that their behavior or sense of self changes. Perhaps the female corporate board member speaks less persuasively than she is capable of speaking, or perhaps the Arab flight attendant chooses a different occupation, thus changing his professional identity. One need not be in an extreme situation to feel the weight of a devalued social identity. More subtle situations may also place a burden upon individuals who are in some way stigmatized. For example, when a woman takes a math test in the presence of men, she may be reminded about the stereotype of male superiority in mathematics that is alive in our culture (Spencer, Steele, and Quinn 1999; Steele and Aronson 1995). Being a woman, and thus, having a social identity that is devalued vis-à-vis mathematics ability, she may have a sense that she could be judged or treated in terms of the stereotype or that she might inadvertently confirm the stereotype. This sense can disrupt her ability to perform up to her potential, a predicament known as “stereotype threat” (Steele and Aronson 1995). In this chapter we will review the literature on stereotype threat as it 115 relates to social identity. Specifically, we will discuss not only how people ’s social identity can either protect them from or create vulnerability to stereotype threat, but also how the experience of stereotype threat can influence their social identity. Thus, we will show that social identity and stereotype threat have a reciprocal relationship. Finally, we will discuss methods of protecting both social identity and achievement from the negative effects of stereotypes.1 Social Identity Affects Vulnerability to Stereotype Threat Over a decade of research has shown that when an individual’s social identity includes a group that is negatively stereotyped in a domain, or area of study, the person is vulnerable to underperformance in that domain (see Steele, Spencer, and Aronson 2002 for a review). This research has also shown, however, that not all members of a stigmatized group have the same degree of vulnerability to stereotype threat. Rather, differences in the degree to which people base their identities on their group membership or on achievement in the stereotyped domain can influence the degree to which they are vulnerable to stereotype-based underperformance. Identification with the Stereotyped Group Some studies suggest that stigmatized individuals whose social identity is strongly aligned with the stereotyped group may be most vulnerable . For example, Toni Schmader (2002) has shown that females who are highly identified with their gender group are most vulnerable to threat. In her study, women and men took a diagnostic math test and in one condition, were told that their scores would be used to compare women to men. Thus, in one condition their performance was linked to their social identity, and in the other condition it was not. For women whose gender was a strong part of their social identity, connecting their math outcomes to their gender suppressed their performance on the math test—they performed worse than the men in this condition. But women who did not consider their gender to be central to their social identity performed just as well as men, regardless of whether or not their math performance was linked to their gender. The opposite happened for men—men who had a strong gender identity benefited from the thought of comparing men’s and women’s math scores. Clearly, the stereotype of men’s greater ability in math was a boon to their performance. Thus the results of this study provide evidence that not all nega116 Contesting Stereotypes tively stereotyped individuals are equally vulnerable to stereotype threat. Rather, in this case, those...