Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 11, 2025
09:55
Bridging the Technology Divide in the COVID-19 Era: Using Virtual Outreach to Expose Middle and High School Students to Imaging Technology
Published on: September 28, 2022
1.7K
Evading Race: STEM Faculty Struggle to Acknowledge Racialized Classroom Events
Gretchen P King1, Tatiane Russo-Tait2, Tessa C Andrews3
1Owens Institute for Behavioral Research, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602.
CBE Life Sciences Education
|February 3, 2023
Summary
STEM classrooms require racial equity. Many instructors avoid discussing race, hindering inclusive practices. Professional development is crucial to address color-evasiveness and anti-Blackness in teaching.
Area of Science:
- Education
- Sociology
- Racial Equity Studies
Background:
- Undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) classrooms are not race-neutral.
- Instructors' perceptions of race and racism influence their adoption of inclusive practices.
- Anti-Black racialized experiences occur in STEM classrooms.
Purpose of the Study:
- To examine how undergraduate STEM instructors perceive anti-Black racialized events in classroom narratives.
- To analyze the relationship between instructors' racial ideology and their noticing of racialized events.
- To identify common forms of color-evasiveness in STEM instructors' responses.
Main Methods:
- Qualitative content analysis of 39 undergraduate STEM instructors' responses to narrative cases.
- Cases described common anti-Black racialized experiences.
- Frameworks of racial noticing and color-evasive racial ideology were used.
Main Results:
- Color-evasive racial ideology was pervasive; 54% of responses avoided discussing race.
- Only 10% of responses acknowledged race or racism in more than one event.
- Six forms of color-evasiveness were characterized.
Conclusions:
- Color-evasion is prevalent in STEM culture.
- Instructors need professional development to counter color-evasiveness and anti-Blackness.
- Systemic change is needed in STEM to promote critical racial consciousness.
Related Concept Videos
02:55Stereotypes, Prejudice, and Discrimination
90.4K
Humans are very diverse and although we share many similarities, we also have many differences. The social groups we belong to help form our identities (Tajfel, 1974). These differences may be difficult for some people to reconcile, which may lead to prejudice toward people who are different. Prejudice is a negative attitude and feeling toward an individual based solely on one’s membership in a particular social group (Allport, 1954; Brown, 2010). Prejudice is common against people who...
90.4K
02:09Stereotype Threat and Self-fulfilling Prophecies
37.7K
When we hold a stereotype about a person, we have expectations that he or she will fulfill that stereotype. A self-fulfilling prophecy is an expectation held by a person that alters his or her behavior in a way that tends to make it true. When we hold stereotypes about a person, we tend to treat the person according to our expectations. This treatment can influence the person to act according to our stereotypic expectations, thus confirming our stereotypic beliefs. Research by Rosenthal and...
37.7K
04:49Robbers Cave
14.3K
During the 1950s, the landmark Robbers Cave experiment demonstrated that when groups must compete with one another, intergroup conflict, hostility, and even violence may result. At the Oklahoman summer camp, two troops of boys—termed the Rattlers and the Eagles—took part in a week-long tournament. During this time, their negativity culminated in derogatory name-calling, fistfights, and even vandalism and destruction of property. However, this work also revealed that such tension...
14.3K
01:14Fundamental Attribution Error
12.9K
According to some social psychologists, people tend to overemphasize internal factors as explanations—or attributions—for the behavior of other people. They tend to assume that the behavior of another person is a trait of that person, and to underestimate the power of the situation on the behavior of others. They tend to fail to recognize when the behavior of another is due to situational variables, and thus to the person’s state. This erroneous assumption is...
12.9K
01:27Ethnic Identity within a Larger Culture
68
Adolescents from ethnic minority backgrounds face a multifaceted journey in forming their identities, shaped by the intersections of cultural expectations and personal exploration. For these adolescents, identity formation involves not only typical developmental challenges but also navigating the perceptions and attitudes of the majority culture. As they grow, adolescents in ethnic minority groups often become increasingly aware of stereotypes, social biases, and discrimination, all of which...
68
02:16Stereotype Content Model
14.8K
The Stereotype Content Model (SCM) was first proposed by Susan Fiske and her colleagues (Fiske, Cuddy, Glick & Xu, 2002; see also Fiske, 2012 and Fiske, 2017). The SCM specifies that when someone encounters a new group, they will stereotype them based on two metrics: warmth—or that group’s perceived intent, and how likely they are to provide help or inflict harm—and competence—or their ability to carry out that objective. Depending on the warmth-competence...
14.8K