Abstract
When the economy declines, racial minorities are hit the hardest. Although existing explanations for this effect focus on institutional causes, recent psychological findings suggest that scarcity may also alter perceptions of race in ways that exacerbate discrimination. We tested the hypothesis that economic resource scarcity causes decision makers to perceive African Americans as "Blacker" and that this visual distortion elicits disparities in the allocation of resources. Studies 1 and 2 demonstrated that scarcity altered perceptions of race, lowering subjects' psychophysical threshold for seeing a mixed-race face as "Black" as opposed to "White." In studies 3 and 4, scarcity led subjects to visualize African American faces as darker and more "stereotypically Black," compared with a control condition. When presented to naïve subjects, face representations produced under scarcity elicited smaller allocations than control-condition representations. Together, these findings introduce a novel perceptual account for the proliferation of racial disparities under economic scarcity.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 9079-9084 |
| Number of pages | 6 |
| Journal | Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America |
| Volume | 111 |
| Issue number | 25 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jun 24 2014 |
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Keywords
- Face processing
- Inequality
- Prejudice
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- General
Cite this
Economic scarcity alters the perception of race. / Krosch, Amy R.; Amodio, David M.
In: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Vol. 111, No. 25, 24.06.2014, p. 9079-9084.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Economic scarcity alters the perception of race
AU - Krosch, Amy R.
AU - Amodio, David M.
PY - 2014/6/24
Y1 - 2014/6/24
N2 - When the economy declines, racial minorities are hit the hardest. Although existing explanations for this effect focus on institutional causes, recent psychological findings suggest that scarcity may also alter perceptions of race in ways that exacerbate discrimination. We tested the hypothesis that economic resource scarcity causes decision makers to perceive African Americans as "Blacker" and that this visual distortion elicits disparities in the allocation of resources. Studies 1 and 2 demonstrated that scarcity altered perceptions of race, lowering subjects' psychophysical threshold for seeing a mixed-race face as "Black" as opposed to "White." In studies 3 and 4, scarcity led subjects to visualize African American faces as darker and more "stereotypically Black," compared with a control condition. When presented to naïve subjects, face representations produced under scarcity elicited smaller allocations than control-condition representations. Together, these findings introduce a novel perceptual account for the proliferation of racial disparities under economic scarcity.
AB - When the economy declines, racial minorities are hit the hardest. Although existing explanations for this effect focus on institutional causes, recent psychological findings suggest that scarcity may also alter perceptions of race in ways that exacerbate discrimination. We tested the hypothesis that economic resource scarcity causes decision makers to perceive African Americans as "Blacker" and that this visual distortion elicits disparities in the allocation of resources. Studies 1 and 2 demonstrated that scarcity altered perceptions of race, lowering subjects' psychophysical threshold for seeing a mixed-race face as "Black" as opposed to "White." In studies 3 and 4, scarcity led subjects to visualize African American faces as darker and more "stereotypically Black," compared with a control condition. When presented to naïve subjects, face representations produced under scarcity elicited smaller allocations than control-condition representations. Together, these findings introduce a novel perceptual account for the proliferation of racial disparities under economic scarcity.
KW - Face processing
KW - Inequality
KW - Prejudice
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84903440297&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84903440297&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1073/pnas.1404448111
DO - 10.1073/pnas.1404448111
M3 - Article
C2 - 24927595
AN - SCOPUS:84903440297
VL - 111
SP - 9079
EP - 9084
JO - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
JF - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
SN - 0027-8424
IS - 25
ER -