SBP: Disaggregating Racial Groups to Understand the Contexts that Shape Discrimination

University Of Washington, Seattle WA

Investigators

Abstract

The United States population is composed of many different racial and ethnic groups. Among the fastest growing of such groups are Asian American and Latinx people. As members of minority groups, Asian American and Latinx people frequently experience discrimination and prejudice. Many decades of research in the social and behavioral sciences has made significant progress in understanding the nature of such discrimination, its harmful consequences, and how policies and practices can be shaped to reduce those harmful effects. This body of theory and research has helped to develop a much better understanding of the many forms of discrimination, and how racial minorities respond to discrimination. Yet the vast majority of this work is based on the Black-White relationship in the U.S. and the specific experiences of African American people. As a result, the unique forms of discrimination faced by Asian American and Latinx people may be overlooked and poorly recognized by those in power. This is important to understand because policies and practices that are meant to remedy forms of discrimination may actually be harmful to the health and success of some people of color in the U.S. This project seeks to refine basic understanding of discrimination in a way that more fully accounts for the forms of discrimination experienced by Asian American and Latinx people, which can ultimately improve the productivity, health, and welfare for all of society. This project uses large-scale audit studies and controlled laboratory experiments to investigate whether racial and ethnic minority groups face different forms of discrimination. The research considers the implications that different forms of discrimination have on the likelihood of reporting discrimination, and how different strategies may be required to reduce discrimination based on which racial and ethnic group is targeted. The project offers a conceptual refinement by distinguishing two dimensions of social stereotypes: perceived inferiority and cultural foreignness. By systematically integrating these two dimensions, new insight will be gained into the distinct forms of discrimination faced by groups who have less-frequently been the focus of theory and research in this area. The research investigates whether Asian American and Latinx people face more discrimination in the labor market than do White and African American people for jobs that require stereotypical American characteristics (e.g., English language abilities). The project also examines whether discrimination based on cultural foreignness is likely to be unrecognized as discrimination by those in power. Experiments also consider unique strategies used by Asian American and Latinx people to cope with these forms of discrimination. Understanding the varying forms of discrimination faced by different racial and ethnic minority groups is a critical step in recognizing, attending to, and eventually eliminating these forms of discrimination. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.