Race and Gender-Based Perceptions of Older Septuagenarian Adults

Older adults face racism, sexism, and ageism. As the U.S. population ages, it is important to understand how the current population views older adults.

Participants recruited through Amazon's Mechanical Turk provided perceptions of older Black and White models' photographs. Using mixed-effect models, we assessed interactions between race and gender of participants and models.

Among Participants of Color and White participants (n = 712, 70% non-Hispanic White, 70% women, mean 37.81 years), Black models were perceived as more attractive, less threatening, and sadder than White models, but differences were greater for White participants (race-by-race interaction: attractive p = 0.003, threatening p = 0.009, sad p = 0.016). Each gender perceived their respective gender as more attractive (gender-by-gender interaction p < 0.0001). Male and female participants perceived male models as happier than female models, but differences were greater for male participants (p = 0.026). Irrespective of participant age group, women were perceived as more threatening (p = 0.012). Other perceptions were not significant.

Participants had few biases toward older Black and White models, while gender biases favored men.