Perceptions of Asian American and Female Leadership Candidates: The Impact of Descriptive and Prescriptive Stereotyping
Year: 2017
Type: dissertation
Abstract: Although Asian Americans and women tend to be relatively well represented in professional roles, they continue to be underrepresented in executive-level leadership positions. This paper examined a combination of factors believed to contribute to the shortage of Asian American and female leaders in organizations – in particular, descriptive and prescriptive stereotyping. Thus, the current study examined how participants responded to an Asian American or White, male or female applicant being considered for a leadership role. All targets were qualified, but varied on levels of warmth and/or dominance. Overall, it was hypothesized that the Asian American and female candidates behaving counterstereotypically (e.g., dominantly) would be subject to backlash, in the form of more negative affective reactions and lower leadership ratings compared to similar White and/or male candidates. A study was conducted online with White male participants recruited from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. Ultimately, the results of the study did not support the predicted hypotheses. A discussion of the results and potential reasons for these findings are included.
Author: Jane Lim
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2756250430