Stereotype effect on behaviour Flashcards
What is a stereotype?
Stereotypes are widely held generalizations about a group of people
What is stereotype threat?
Stereotype threat is internalising the ideas that come from the stereotype such that it affects your behaviour and becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
We categorize information using the schema theory and it allows us to make generalizations about people.
The out-group homogeneity effect is a hypothesis that out-group members as being more similar to one another.
If we combine this with social identity theory, we can see how negative stereotypes of out-groups could be formed: we want to view out-groups as inferior in some way to** boost our own self-esteem** by comparing that inferior group with our superior in-group.
Aim of Steele & Aronson?
To show how stereotype threat may affect an individual’s test performance
Method of Steele & Aronson?
- black and white undergraduates from Stanford University
- Two IV: the race of the participant and the test descriptions
- The participants were given a standardized test of verbal ability and were told one of two things
○ 1: it is a test to diagnose your intellectual ability
○ It is a test of your problem-solving skills - Participants were randomly assigned to one of the conditions with equal numbers of participants in each condition
Findings of Steele & Aronson?
- No significant difference between male and female participants
- African Americans did poorly when they believed that the test was a test of their ability, but did just as well as the white Americans when they believed that is was a test of their problem-solving skills
Conclusion of Steele & Aronson?
African American participants performed less well than their white counterparts in the stereotype threat condition but in the non-threat condition, their performance equalled that of their white counterparts.
