Year: 2015
Type: dissertation
Abstract: Although multicultural messages value and encourage the expression of group differences, this approach to diversity may ironically constrain racial minorities' behavior and promote selfstereotyping.Self-stereotyping in multicultural workplaces may be particularly pronounced among weakly racially identified minorities who, compared to strongly identified minorities, are more willing to engage in identity-related self-presentational strategies to obtain desired outcomes.In four studies, online community samples of African American (Studies 1-4; N = 1,055) and White adults (Study 2; N = 1,586), who varied in their strength of racial identification, imagined interviewing at a company that either advocated managing diversity through multiculturalism or colorblindness or had no diversity message.When exposed to the multicultural company, African Americans presented themselves as more stereotypically African American (e.g., athletic and streetwise) than in the colorblind company, but only if they were weakly identified with their racial group.Weakly identified African Americans also felt more anxious and less like they could be themselves at the multicultural company compared to the colorblind company.White participants and strongly racially identified Black participants were unaffected by the company's diversity message.These findings show that, despite their best intentions, organizations striving to be inclusive may paradoxically create pressure for some
Author: Teri A. Kirby
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Reduced inequalities
Open Access status: green
Funder: National Science Foundation
OpenAlex ID: W2286472412