The Distribution of Asian American Scholarship Awards Among Chinese, Indian, and Filipino Individuals

Perceptions of group typicality can shape how resources, such as scholarships, are distributed among group members. Across two studies, we predicted that East Asian applicants (e.g., Chinese) would be perceived as more typical of Asian Americans and thus more likely to be seen as worthy of an Asian American scholarship than their South Asian (e.g., Indian) and Southeast Asian (e.g., Filipino) counterparts. In Study 1, Chinese applicants were rated as more worthy of an Asian American scholarship than both Indian and Filipino applicants. Moreover, perceptions of Asian typicality predicted greater scholarship worthiness. In Study 2, we added a general scholarship condition that did not specify ethnicity to test whether Asian typicality influenced scholarship worthiness when the award was not designated for Asian Americans. However, we did not find the expected interaction between applicant ethnicity and scholarship type. Instead, we found only that the Chinese applicant was rated as more worthy of scholarships, regardless of scholarship type. Overall, perceptions of Asian typicality may guide judgements of scholarship worthiness in contexts where Asian identity is relevant.