Domain-specific effects of stereotypes on performance

The influence of male faces on stereotype activation among women in STEM: An ERP investigation

Members of stereotyped groups are vigilant to situational cues signaling threats to their social identity. In one psychophysiological experiment, we examined whether mere exposure to a watching male face would increase attentional vigilance among female STEM students due to the activation of math-gender stereotypes. Male and female students performed an alleged math intelligence task while being primed with male faces or control images. Automatic responses to errors were captured with error-related negativity (ERN), a neural index of error vigilance. Women showed larger ERN upon making errors when primed with male faces compared to control images, whereas no such priming effect occurred among men. Moreover, this face priming effect was pronounced only among women highly invested in pursuing STEM careers. These findings suggest that minimalistic social cues may activate negative stereotypes early in informational processing, thereby selectively shunting attention on errors in stereotype-relevant tasks among individuals invested in the performance domain.

Stereotype Threat Among Girls

Effects of stereotype threat on math performance have been well-documented among college women; however, the prevalence among adolescent girls is less well-known. Further, the moderating role of gender identity and effects of stereotype threat on high achieving girls in math is unknown. This study tested the effects of a stereotype threat condition (vs. control group) among middle school girls in standard and honors math classes and examined gender identity as a moderator. Students ( N = 498) completed pre- and post-questionnaires and a math test as part of a stereotype threat experiment. Gender identity moderated effects of stereotype threat on math discounting, disengagement, attitudes, and performance, but whether gender identity was a protective or risk factor differed by math education context (honors math and standard math classes). Gender identity was protective for girls in honors math for attitudes, discounting, and disengagement but was a risk factor for math performance. Gender identity was a risk factor for disengagement and math attitudes among girls in standard math classes, but was a buffer for math performance. Results suggest the need to examine protective and risk properties of gender identity importance for adolescent girls and the need to examine stereotype threat within educational contexts. Stereotype threat can be reduced through interventions; thus, educators and practitioners can collaborate with social scientists to implement widespread interventions in K–12 schools. Additional online materials for this article are available on PWQ’s website at http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/suppl/10.1177/0361684317711412 . Online slides for instructors who want to use this article for teaching are available on PWQ's website at http://journals.sagepub.com/page/pwq/suppl/index

A Replication Attempt of Stereotype Susceptibility ()

Awareness of stereotypes about a person’s in-group can affect a person’s behavior and performance when they complete a stereotype-relevant task, a phenomenon called stereotype susceptibility. Shih, Pittinsky, and Ambady (1999) primed Asian American women with either their Asian identity (stereotyped with high math ability) or female identity (stereotyped with low math ability) or no priming before administering a math test. Of the three groups, Asian-primed participants performed best on the math test, female-primed participants performed worst. The article is a citation classic, but the original studies and conceptual replications have low sample sizes and wide confidence intervals. We conducted a replication of Shih et al. (1999) with a large sample and found a significant effect with the same pattern of means after removing participants that did not know the race or gender stereotypes, but not when those participants were retained. Math identification did not moderate the observed effects.

When Chronic Isn't Chronic: The Moderating Role of Active Self-Aspects

The current work considered how self-concept organization moderates the consequences of chronic attributes, which are widely assumed to be always accessible and influential. In Study 1, the accessibility of participants' chronic attributes was assessed before and after activating a self-aspect that was either relevant or irrelevant to participants' chronic attributes. Results showed that chronic attributes were more accessible when they were relevant to a participant's active self-aspect than when they were irrelevant to it. In Study 2, participants read ambiguous behaviors performed by others, some of which could be interpreted in line with their own chronic attribute or an alternative attribute. Participants were more likely to interpret behaviors as consistent with their own chronic attributes, but only when a relevant self-aspect had been previously activated. These studies suggest that chronicity can be moderated by self-aspect activation, consistent with the perspective that the self consists of multiple, context-dependent self-aspects.

Gender Stereotypes and Women's Reports of Liking and Ability in Traditionally Masculine and Feminine Occupations

Gender stereotypes were examined for their causal influence on women's reported liking for and perceived ability to succeed in traditionally masculine and feminine occupations. One hundred twenty-one women were assigned to either a gender-stereotype activation or filler task and then completed measures of liking for, and perceived ability to succeed in, traditionally masculine and feminine occupations. Strongly gender-identified women showed significantly greater liking for feminine occupations in the stereotype-activation condition than in the control condition. However, more weakly identified women did not show the same effect. In contrast, women weak in gender identification reported an increase in perceived ability for feminine occupations when stereotypes were activated than in the control condition. Activating gender stereotypes did not shift reported liking or perceived ability in traditionally masculine occupations. These results demonstrate the theoretical and practical importance of gender stereotypes on women's career-related attitudes.