Stereotype Threat, Research Paper Example

Stereotype threat is a situational dilemma that predisposes persons to negative stereotype risks (Steele and Aronson 1995). Under such situations, people are usually evaluated by stereotypical generalizations instead of merit. Empirical studies over the previous decade indicate that stereotype threat lowers the performance among the Latinos, African-Americans, and the poor. However, Steele and Aronson (1995) add that the vice also affects elder people in memory, women in science and mathematics and white people in athletics. Nonetheless, the effects of stereotypes have been indicated in various situations where different stereotypes are involved. Consequently, researchers converge that stereotype awareness may assist to minimize some of the influence of stereotype threat.

However, despite robustness of the menace, researchers have not determined the exact mechanism that stereotype threat uses to hurt individual performance. The ambiguity is manifested in the diverse consequences, with each leading to decreased performance. Some of the factors that play a role include self-consciousness, anxiety and narrowed attention, withdrawal of effort, distraction and over effort (Steele and Aronson, 1995). Other empirical studies have also shown convergence on the role of some of these factors in promoting the vice of stereotype threat among various groups.

Various researchers converge that a combination of these factors often leads to minimized or reduced performance. For instance, Schmader, Johns, and Forbes (2008) proposed three interconnected factors that hinder performance. Although these factors work in different ways, they all lead to reduced efficiency of the working memory. The most common factor relates to the psychological stress, which usually arises due to stereotype threat. The second factor relates to performance monitoring in situations where individuals are attempting to regulate their response to the stereotypical threat, and finally the emotional regulation effort, where people try to control affective responses that usually arise when threatened.  Each of these factors has a potential to reduce the effective allocation and quantity of cognitive resources involved in the enhancement of optimal performance. Therefore, cognitive and affective factors can work together to influence performance quality in activities that require focus and maximum effort.

According to previous Studies, stereotype threat potentially undermines working memory resources, thus affecting the capacity of the brain to attain its required information processing function. According to Shmader and Johns (2003), stereotype threat minimizes the capacity of working memory. For instance, the two scholars say that women perform poorly in math. It’s because of the stereotype that female students are usually poor at mathematics compared to their male counterparts. Thus, the pressure-related thoughts induced by stereotype threat are responsible for the reduction in the memory resources of the brain.

Moreover, activities performed using the working memory resources of the brain are usually detrimentally affected in the presence of stereotypically threatening situations. Conversely, stereotype threat often creates tension, concerns and increase worries. These thoughts usually reduce the capacity of the working memory, which is necessary for meeting the requirements of the brain to process information related to performing particular activities. Thus, when the working memory resources are reduced, some functions, components, and tasks may not be performed efficiently by the human brain. Research by Stone and McWhinnie (2008) stated that mild stereotype threat only affects task components that usually require focused attention and concentration for an extended period.

Stereotype threat also reduces flexibility, creativity, and speed. Different studies suggest that in particular scenarios, stereotype threat usually triggers a regulatory state that hinders focus through enforcing vigilance among people with the perception to avoid failure. Under such situations, people tend to become risk averse and do not prefer to undertake activities that require analytical thinking and high accuracy of performance. When individuals become vigilant in such scenarios, they usually record poor performance in activities that utilize flexibility, openness, creativity and speed (Osborne, Kellow and Jones, 2007). However, because most of the everyday tasks require some degree of flexibility, openness, speed and analytical thinking, performance will automatically be hindered when prevention focus is induced.  For instance, Osborne, Kellow, and Jones (2007) showed that stereotype threat undermined the performance of African Americans. The result of this research is in tandem with findings of other studies, which indicate that lowered performance expectation directly correlates with poor performance in situations where stereotype threat is involved.

Empirical studies also converge that stereotype threat can lead to loss of enthusiasm and distraction through heightened stereotype related thinking and thus lead to a negative influence on performance. Moreover, stereotype threat influences individuals’ intellectual performance (Steele and Aronson, 1995). For instance, the research found out that racial stereotype contributes to lower performance among the African Americans. The findings also indicated that reinforcement of domain specific stereotypes influence performance. The situation is quite similar to research conducted to examine the performance of women in math, where women under the stereotype recorded dismal performance compared to their counterparts who were not subjected to such stereotype threats. According to Keller and Dauenheimer (2003), female students who experienced stereotype threats reported sadness, frustrations, and disappointment, which ostensibly led to poor performance in math.

Negative emotions and thoughts lower expectations. When people expect poor results from an activity, they have a higher likelihood of recording poor results unlike in scenarios where they have high confidence in their performance. Researchers converge that activating stereotype threat lowers performance expectations. For instance, Ben-Zeev, Fein, and Inzlicht (2005) confirmed that individuals who have been identified to fall within the threatened domain are more likely to record deficits in their performance. The hypothesis of this study supported the findings of the previous studies that stated that stereotype threat triggers arousal, which plays a major role in performance. In the two independent studies conducted by these researchers, the findings indicated that stereotype threat creates an environment that threatens intellectual thinking, which impairs performance.

Therefore, analysis of previous studies overrules any assumption that culture or genetics make some particular group of students perform poorly compared to others. However, the studies indicate that such poor performance result from negative stereotypes that inhibit self-confidence and raise anxieties in the mind of such studies (Steele & Aronson, 1995). Thus, the students will record poor results not due to their inability to prepare for the texts of due to their cultural of genetic makeup but due to the stereotype threat.

References

Ben-Zeev, T., Fein, S., & Inzlicht, M. (2005). Arousal and stereotype threat. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 41(2), 174-181.

Keller, J., & Dauenheimer, D. (2003). Stereotype threat in the classroom: Dejection mediates the disrupting threat effect on women’s math performance. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 29(3), 371-381.

Osborne, J. W., Kellow, J. T., & Jones, B. D. (2007). Identification with academics, stereotype threat, and motivation to achieve in school. Standards in education: Sociocultural influences on motivation and learning, 119-146.

Schmader, T., & Johns, M. (2003). Converging evidence that stereotype threat reduces working memory capacity. Journal of personality and social psychology, 85(3), 440.

Schmader, T., Johns, M., & Forbes, C. (2008). An integrated process model of stereotype threat effects on performance. Psychological review, 115(2), 336.

Steele, C. M., & Aronson, J. (1995). Stereotype threat and the intellectual test performance of African Americans. Journal of personality and social psychology, 69(5), 797.

Stone, J., & McWhinnie, C. (2008). Evidence that blatant versus subtle stereotype threat cues impact performance through dual processes. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 44(2), 445-452.