Research Paper on Stereotype Threat

Stereotype Threat in a h octads Stakes Testing Environment Jennifer J. Krebs Wilkes University Abstract Given the rapidly ever-changing demographics of todays classrooms unite with the uplifted-stakes attempting purlieu created by the expiration of No Child Left Behind, it is important to beneathstand potential explanations for the persistency of achievement gaps. Explanations for the achievement gap have included high populations of face Language Learners (ELLs), socioeconomic issues, lack of resources at the school, teacher, and student levels, and even natural differences in the intellectual abilities of separated and non- bossd sorts.A theory incured by Steele and Aronson, c exclusivelyed stomp scourge, provided a radical view into how fellowship of embosss affects performance (McKown & Strambler, 2009). Stereotype affright is the experience of anxiety or concern in a berth where a person has the potential to confirm a ostracize stereotype about their social gro up. The purpose of this research was to determine how and when children sustain to develop noesis of stereotypes and how stereotype threat affects academic performance. IntroductionThe diversity of student demographics increases all day. Therefore, teachers must be increasingly more than aware of the cultural differences and challenges that students from diverse backgrounds bring to school. Not moreover are these students presumable to learn other than based on their cultural expectations, but these students are as well as likely to possess knowledge of commonly held social stereotypes which can contradictly refer their performance (McKown & Strambler, 2009). The current emphasis on high-stakes evidenceing makes the achievement of all students extremely important.Experimental research into performance gaps was limited prior to a modern study that focuse on the possibility of stereotype threat. First describe by social psychologist Claude Steele and his colleagues, stereo type threat (ST) has been shown to reduce the performance of individuals who live to negatively stereotyped groups (McKown & Strambler, 2009). Since its introduction into the academic literature in 1995, stereotype threat has become one of the most widely studied topics in the field of psychology.However, a major assumption of this theory was that children possess knowledge of commonly held social stereotypes. In order to address this assumption, the following qualitative studies were implemented to determine how and when children begin to develop knowledge of stereotypes. This research is combined with quantitative studies to determine how ST affects academic performance. Method Schaffer and Skinner (2009) examined student interactions inside four fourth grade classrooms at a diverse national school in the southeastern United States.Upon observing student interactions and conducting interviews, the researchers observed several patterns. First, white children were less likely to engage in unmistakable race talk, while black students frequently engaged in openly racial discussions and often employ commonly held stereotypes to identify themselves. Second, most nonage students who performed at the high end of the class and participated in challenging academic programs relied heavily on racial stereotypes to bridge the social gap amongst themselves and their racial peers.These students sought to distance themselves from the white students with whom they took advanced classes. Third, white students were more likely to describe students of other races as loud or troublemaking (Schaffer & Skinner, 2009). These observations fire that students were not only aware of commonly held stereotypes, but strategically used them to organize their social world and dictate social functions. Another study, which examined high school students, suggested that these trends continue as students mature rather than diminish. Lisa M.Nunn (2011) observed sextuplet classrooms acros s triad different high schools, and conducted 57 interviews with students to determine the slipway in which students classroom interactions reflected ideas about commonly held stereotypes. In one school, nearly half of the students interviewed said that race matters for school success. At another school, students convey frustration with being racial targets and felt they had done nothing to resurrect degrading views from their classmates. Furthermore, in a remedial English classroom consisting of eight students, the researcher noticed a ommon occurrence. Five of the students in this classroom were Latino, and three were white. The white students all had learning disabilities which hindered their language usage, while the Latino students only handicap was that English was not their native language (Nunn, 2011). Combining ELLs with students with disabilities in effect treats the native language of ELLs as a learning dis readiness. Between the racial views of the students and the systematic reinforcement of prejudices, it is easy to understand why students tend to shoot views that race matters for success.The question that remains is how does this knowledge of stereotypes affect student academic performance? McKown and Strambler (2009) conducted a study of 124 students ranging in age from grades K-4 in a suburban Chicago area. The students were given a series of vignettes to determine their ability to identify stereotypes and then placed in diagnostic or non-diagnostic groups to effect performance tasks. Consistent with prior research, minority participants in the diagnostic group performed worse than in the non-diagnostic group and majority participants performed equally well in both groups (McKown & Strambler, 2009).Desert, Preaux, and Jund (2009) administered Ravens APM to 153 children within first and third grades. In the diagnostic group, students were given the standard administration instructions as provided in the Ravens APM Administration Manual. In the non-diagnostic group, students were given instructions explaining that the test was actually a series of games that the researchers developed and were examen to determine their appropriateness for the students age groups.Researchers stratified the results based on socioeconomic status, arguing that negative stereotypes about the performance of low-SES students could result in ST. The results of the study showed that low-SES students in the diagnostic group performed significantly worse than those in the non-diagnostic group. The performance of high SES students did not differ significantly among the two groups (Desert, Preaux, & Jund, 2009). These results suggested that children in the early elementary geezerhood are not immune to ST, even on a test that is supposed to be culture free. While all of these experiments support he theory of ST, one of the strongest arguments to date relies heavily on developing technologies. Derks, Inzlicht, and Kang (2008) offered an overvi ew of break bys in social neuroscience research that highlighted biological factors underlying conditions of stereotype threat. The researchers discussed several experiments that used functional magnetic resonance imagining (fMRI), electroencephalography (EEG), and event-related potentials (ERP) to measure the neurological activities of participants when asked to perform tasks under diagnostic and non-diagnostic conditions.One study tested women under mathematical performance stereotypes and erect that the conflict monitoring systems of the brain showed a mis-regulation of neural responses. This information back up the hypothesis that emotions aroused by ST conditions lead to a decrease in cognitive ability. The decrease in ability occurred because emotion-regulation centers of the brain experience change magnitude activity while areas of the brain associated with academic performance and cognition experienced decreased activity. The researchers cautioned that neuroscience exper iments in the area are too new to vacate for generalizations and definitive findings.However, they argued that development of this area is crucial to the study and understanding of stereotype threat (Derks, Inzlicht, & Kang, 2008). Results The assumption that the performance gap between stereotyped and non-stereotyped groups is solely rooted in cultural differences and limitations of students background is restrictive. Research has shown that there is also a factor of social psychological threat related to knowledge and perceptions of stereotypes, which can depress test scores of stereotyped individuals.The use of high-stakes testing in an overall environment of racial inequality perpetuates that inequality through the emotional and psychological power of the tests over the test-takers. While researchers have begun to jab into the intricacies as to how stereotype threat causes decreases in performance and other negative effects, there is still much research that needs to be conduc ted in order to completely understand the mechanisms that underlie the performance deficits that occur as a result of stereotype threat. ConclusionIn conclusion, stereotype threat is a pervasive phenomenon that has the ability to impact a variety of individuals in a number of ways. Current research offers us insight as to what stereotype threat is, how it impacts individuals, what mechanisms drive the relationship between stereotype threat and performance, and how we can begin to remediate some of the damaging impacts of this threat. Since the current emphasis on high-stakes testing does not appear to be diminishing, teachers and mentors should at a minimum apparel students with knowledge about the possible effects of stereotype threat.In this way, proactive strategies mogul transform a powerless situation into one where students are actively participating in discussions that illuminate the complexities and strengths of their educational futures. Teacher education programs shoul d suss out their course curriculum and address any gaps in the discussion of regularize testing and methods to improve test scores. Changing test directions from diagnostic to non-diagnostic, educating students in malleable intelligence theories, and reducing the general stress of the testing environment are all methods which could be implemented.References Derks, B. , Inzlicht, M. , & Kang, S. (2008). The neuroscience of stigma and stereotype threat. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 11(2), 163-181. Desert, M. , Preaux, M. , & Jund, R. (2009). So young and already victims of stereotype threat Socio-economic status and performance of 6 to 9 years old children on Ravens liberal matrices. European Journal of Psychology of rearing, 24, 207-218. McKown, C. & Strambler, M. J. (2009).Developmental antecedents and social academic consequences of stereotype-consciousness in position childhood. Child Development, 80, 1643-1659. Nunn, L. (2011). Classrooms as racialized spaces Dynam ics of collaboration, tension, and student attitudes in urban and suburban high schools. Urban Education, 46, 1226-1255. Schaffer, R. & Skinner, D. G. (2009). Performing race in four culturally diverse fourth grade classrooms Silence, race talk, and the negotiation of social boundaries. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 40, 277-296.