Stereotype threat

Stereotype threat "is a disruptive concern, when facing a negative stereotype, that one will be evaluated based on this stereotype." One published meta-analysis conducted by Walton & Spencer (2009) found significant evidence that stereotype threat impairs the standardized test performances of African Americans and women on the SAT. However, an unpublished meta-analysis of 55 published and unpublished studies shows mixed evidence of this effect.

Definition

Stereotype threat is "a disruptive concern, when facing a negative stereotype, that one will be evaluated based on this stereotype." Stereotype threat has been shown to undermine the performance of members of a number of groups in a number of domains. “Culturally-shared stereotypes suggesting poor performance of certain groups can, when made salient in a context involving the stereotype, disrupt performance of an individual who identifies with that group” (Steele, Aronson 1995).

Although Steele and Aronson focused on the emphasis on race affecting test performance, similar studies have demonstrated the same results for emphasis on gender. In other studies, researchers found that “consistent exposure to stereotype threat (e.g., faced by some ethnic minorities in academic environments and women in math) can reduce the degree to which individuals value the domain in question” (Aronson, et al. 2002; Osborne, 1995; Steele, 1997). Also, research has found that there are varying degrees of an individual on a certain group to be affected by stereotype threat:

"…some members may be more vulnerable to its negative consequences than others; factors such as the strength of one’s group identification or domain identification have been shown to be related to one's subsequent vulnerability to stereotype threat" (http://www.reducingstereotypethreat.org/definition.html)

Further research has also found that when an individual identifies with a specific group, performance can be negatively affected, because of concerns that they will, in fact, confirm the negative stereotypes of that group.