Browsing by Subject "Prejudice"

Now showing 1 - 6 of 6
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    Cognitive and task performance consequences for women who confront vs. fail to confront sexism
    (2014-07-31) Gorski, Kimberly M.; Ashburn-Nardo, Leslie; Morris, Kathryn A.; Williams, Jane R.; Grahame, Nicholas J.
    Women who fail to confront sexism can experience negative intrapersonal consequences, such as greater negative self-directed affect (negself) and greater obsessive thoughts, particularly if they are highly committed to challenging sexism. Female undergraduates (N = 392) were sampled to investigate whether failing to confront past sexism influences future task performance and whether any effects on performance occur through the depletion of cognitive resources. Participants were randomly assigned to recall either confronting or failing to confront past sexism, then completed measures of affect, obsessive thoughts, working memory, and performance. Women who recalled failing to confront were expected to have greater negself and obsessive thoughts related to the situation and lower working memory and performance, and desire to respond to the situation was expected to moderate these effects. As predicted, compared with women who recalled confronting, women who recalled failing to confront reported greater negself. Contrary to predictions, there was no significant effect of confrontation condition on obsessive thoughts, working memory, or performance. However, condition interacted with desire to confront, such that the more women who recalled failing to confront wanted to respond to the situation, the more negself they reported and the lower their working memory. In addition, for women who recalled confronting, greater desire to respond was associated with higher performance, while desire to respond was unrelated to performance for women who recalled failing to confront. In contrast to predictions, neither obsessive thoughts nor working memory mediated the failure to confront-performance relationship, and there was no evidence of moderated mediation. In sum, although the cognitive variables of obsessive thoughts and working memory did not mediate the effect of failing to confront on performance, the results nevertheless demonstrate the importance of confronting sexism, particularly when one wants to do so, and have important implications for settings like the workplace where women may face discrimination and have to decide whether or not to confront.
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    Confrontation of Prejudice in the Workplace: The Role of Observer Prejudice Level, Discrimination Type, and Perpetrator Status
    (2011-08-16) Petersson, Jessica L.; Ashburn-Nardo, Leslie
    The Confronting Prejudiced Responses (CPR) Model (Ashburn-Nardo, Morris, & Goodwin, 2008) describes factors that predict whether people confront prejudice that they witness. The present research examined some of these factors, including: observer prejudice level (low to high), discrimination type (racism or sexism), and perpetrator status (subordinate, peer, or supervisor to observer). Three hundred forty students from a large urban university in the Midwest read scenarios involving racism or sexism and completed items related to the CPR Model and measures of racial vs. gender attitudes. Results indicated that participants were more likely to report that they would confront racism than sexism, especially to the extent that they had low-prejudice attitudes. In addition, participants were less likely to report directly confronting (and more likely to report the incident to an authority when the perpetrator was) a supervisor than a peer or subordinate. Implications of this research include using the CPR Model as a method to educate organizations on prejudice reduction strategies in the workplace.
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    Diminishing the Threat: Reducing Intergroup Anxiety and Prejudice in Individuals Low in Openness to Experience
    (2019-05) Burrows, Dominique; Ashburn-Nardo, Leslie; Pietri, Evava; Lindsey, Alex
    As the world continues to diversify and we begin to move towards a majority-minority America, it becomes ever critical for organizations to utilize diversity training effectively to create a more equitable work environment. This is especially true when considering the growth of Latino immigrants in the work force and how majority group members may view this as a threat to their group dominance, resulting in experiences of discrimination and prejudice towards minorities. However, research regarding the best methods to utilize to reduce prejudice against specific targeted groups has been inconclusive, and little work has been done to investigate personality characteristics as potential boundary conditions of diversity training effectiveness. Thus, the goal of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of two diversity training methods, perspective taking and imagined contact, specifically for trainees low in Openness to Experience who may be especially resistant to training. To test this over two time points (two weeks apart), we recruited White participants ( N= 471) via Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, highlighted the demographic changes occurring in the modern workforce, randomly assigned them to either the perspective taking, imagined contact, or control condition, and then measured their Openness to Experience, intergroup anxiety, prejudiced attitudes and behavioral intentions towards Latino immigrants. Results revealed no significant interactions with Openness to Experience, thus resulting in its omission from the final model. Results also did not provide evidence for the training methods having a significant direct effect on the reduction of prejudice and the increase in behavioral intentions towards Latino immigrants. However, there was support found for intergroup anxiety such that it mediated the relationship between the diversity training methods and prejudiced attitudes and behavioral intentions. Exploratory analyses also revealed imagined contact to be more effective at reducing prejudice and increasing positive behavioral intentions via a reduction in intergroup anxiety compared to the perspective taking condition. Implications, future research, and limitations are discussed.
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    Effects of Perceived Discrimination on Depressive Symptoms Among Black Men Residing in the United States: A Meta-Analysis
    (Sage, 2018) Britt-Spells, Angelitta M.; Slebodnik, Maribeth; Sands, Laura P.; Rollock, David
    Research reports that perceived discrimination is positively associated with depressive symptoms. The literature is limited when examining this relationship among Black men. This meta-analysis systematically examines the current literature and investigates the relationship of perceived discrimination on depressive symptoms among Black men residing in the United States. Using a random-effects model, study findings indicate a positive association between perceived discrimination and depressive symptoms among Black men ( r = .29). Several potential moderators were also examined in this study; however, there were no significant moderation effects detected. Recommendations and implications for future research and practice are discussed.
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    The role of identity in understanding prejudice within the LGBTQ+ community
    (2021-10) Muller, Linda; Ashburn-Nardo, Leslie; Pietri, Evava; Andel, Stephanie
    This study explored lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) individuals’ strength of identification with their subgroup (lesbian/gay or bisexual) and superordinate group (LGBTQ+) and whether the discrepancy between these identity dimensions relates to binegativity (the stigmatization of bisexuality). Our hypothesis that there would be a significant main effect of self-categorization level (superordinate vs. subgroup) on identity centrality was not supported. Our hypothesis that the difference between strength of subgroup and superordinate group identity centrality would be related to expressed binegativity among LG participants was partially supported. There was a significant negative correlation suggesting that as participants felt that their subgroup was relatively more important than the superordinate group, the less they acknowledged the existence of prejudice against bisexuals. Additionally, bisexuality threat, stigma-based solidarity, linked fate, and ingroup representations were significantly correlated with binegativity. Our results provide a first foundational step in a series of studies that will investigate the causes of binegativity among LG people and potential interventions.
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    When science gets ugly – the story of Philipp Lenard and Albert Einstein
    (The Conversation US, Inc., 2015-06-16) Gunderman, Richard; Radiology and Imaging Sciences, School of Medicine