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In Part I of this post, I wrote about the power of stereotypes to shape human performance even when they aren't discussed aloud. Simply suspecting that others are making evaluations based on preconceived notions about "people like you" has an impact. Psychologists refer to this phenomenon as stereotype threat, and it explains why being asked to record their race on a demographic form was enough to lead Black (but not White) Stanford students to underperform on a subsequent SAT test.
One of the questions I raised at the end of the previous post was: how pervasive is this tendency? Well, it's not limited to stereotypes based on race, that's for sure. Because in a series of studies a few years later, researchers at the University of Michigan found that stereotype threat could influence women's math performance as well.
In one of these studies, some students were told that a test they were about to take had been found previously to produce gender differences. Lo and behold, when they then took the test, the average man outperformed the average woman.
But maybe these men were just better at math than these women, you might suggest. Or perhaps the specific content of the test really was gender-biased? You know, a lot of questions about football blitzes, adam's apples, testicle care, and the like?
(I know, I know, on the first count, at least, I'm trading in stereotypes. And I admit: it's not like my fantasy football team's off to a particularly impressive start, so forgive me.)
But that isn't what was happening in the study. Because when the exact same test was given to a different group of students at the same school–except this time with an explanation that the test had not been found to produce gender differences in the past–suddenly male and female test-takers performed comparably. So clearly, stereotype threat can operate on gendered terms as well as racial ones.
And subsequent research has made it clear that you don't have to be a member of a minority group or a traditionally disadvantaged group for stereotype threat to affect you. Even White men can be influenced by it: in another set of studies, White males who read information that emphasized how well Asian students typically do in math performed worse on a subsequent math test than did White men who hadn't read this.
The power of stereotypes is far-reaching. So much so that the same person can both benefit and suffer from their influence, depending on the situation. In yet another series of studies, a different group of researchers examined the math performance of Asian women. When these women were first given a survey that focused on gender identity, their subsequent math performance declined. But those women who instead completed a survey focusing on their ethnic, Asian identity showed a significant improvement in test performance.
And it's not that these stereotypes in the air only influence academic performance and test-taking, either. Researchers have found that stereotype threat undermines the memory of older adults. The athletic performance of White guys. The ability of gay men to interact with kids without feeling anxious. And more.
The second question I posed at the end of the previous post was: what can we do about it? A wide range of potential strategies for addressing stereotype threat have been proposed and tested (see here for an extensive review). A few examples include:
• Emphasizing the external reasons why some tests (or other forms of performance) are difficult. Remind the students in your life (or yourself) that the transition to a new school and a new set of challenges is one that everyone struggles with, but it gets easier with time. Giving people an external explanation to hang their hat on as they start to experience the frustrations and setbacks of new surroundings allows them to maintain the energy necessary to keep at it long enough to see the light of improvement at the end of the tunnel.
• Promoting self-affirmation in other domains. Encouraging students to reflect on their own skills and accomplishments can enable a buffer against the potential effects of stereotype threat. Simply spending a few minutes each day thinking about your most important personal values (and why they're so important) has been found to give you the strength to ward off much of the threat posed by others' expectations.
• Remembering that intelligence is a fluid, not fixed concept. As I blogged about last month, there are downsides to thinking about smarts in terms of either you have them or you don't. Instead, you're better off thinking of intellect as something that develops with effort and through trial-and-error–much like a muscle that grows stronger with repeated exercise. Seeing intelligence this way also makes you less susceptible to the threats posed by stereotypes.
So as we march through yet another back-to-school season, be kind to the students in your life. Their minds are swimming with new questions, doubts, and anxieties; they're wrestling with new challenges as well as new surroundings. And don't forget that some of the obstacles they have to overcome aren't visible to the naked eye–they're just out there in the ether and ready to emerge at the least opportune of times.
