Racial Microaggressions,Whiteness, and Feminist Therapy

Over the last decade, several authors have described the role of racial microaggressions in the lives of historically marginalized populations. However, the exact mechanisms in which racial microaggressions manifest in psychotherapy remain an area in need of further exploration. Drawing from research and scholarship on Feminist therapy and microaggressions, we use a case vignette of a 40-year-old African-American woman in treatment for depression with a White female therapist to demonstrate how microaggressions may unwittingly occur in a clinician–client dyad. We underscore the challenges that White therapists may encounter and provide suggestions and recommendations for culturally responsive therapy.     

The relationship of microaggressions with alcohol use and anxiety among ethnic minority college students in a historically White institution

Little is known about how microaggressions may impact the health and mental health of college students of color attending historically White universities. In this study, students provided self-report of the number of racial and ethnic microaggressions they had experienced over the previous month, as well as data on anxiety symptoms (Beck Anxiety Inventory), alcohol consumption (Daily Drinking Questionnaire) and consequences (Rutgers Alcohol Problem Index), and self-efficacy to cope with daily hassles (General Self-efficacy Scale) and with high risk drinking situations (Situational Confidence Questionnaire). As expected, students of color reported significantly more microaggressions than their European American counterparts. Microaggressions and self-efficacy were significantly associated with anxiety (Full Model R2 = .20; p < .001), microaggressions and self-efficacy were significantly associated with binge drinking (Full Model R2 = .10; p < .01), and microaggressions, binge drinking events, self-efficacy, and microaggressions × self-efficacy interaction were significantly associated with alcohol related consequences (Full Model R2 = .28; p < .001) among the students of color. Results suggest that microaggressions may represent a health and mental health risk to students of color. Implications of study results and future research directions are discussed.     

Bystander training for faculty: A promising approach to tackling microaggressions in the academy

Microaggressions present significant barriers to entry and advancement for faculty from traditionally marginalized groups, yet workplace interventions to stymy them remain undocumented in the literature. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact of bystander training to deal with subtle expressions of bias in the academic workplace. We developed a 2-h interactive bystander training workshop that specifically addressed intervening in microaggressions university faculty experience; approximately 21% of the full-time faculty participated in the training. Results indicate that post workshop, participants endorsed higher levels of likelihood of bystander intervention and higher levels of bystander efficacy to deal with microaggressive events (compared to pre-test 4 days before the workshop); scores on these measures remained significantly greater than pre-test at both 6-week and 12-week follow-up. Furthermore, preliminary evidence suggests that both likelihood of bystander intervention and bystander efficacy scores predicted self-reported bystander behavior at both 6 and 12 week follow up. These findings suggest that bystander training may be a promising approach to tackling microaggressions faculty experience in higher education.     

Women of color in academic administration: Trends,progress, and barriers

Women of color in academic administration are a recent phenomenon due to their double oppression as women and people of color. Their small numbers are intimately tied to American history, legal restrictions, and traditional customs. Legislation, court orders, and executive orders have greatly increased the number of minorities in higher education, although they are still substantially underrepresented in the academy. Women Ph.D.s—and to a lesser extent, administrators—are growing as a proportion of all Ph.D.s, but there will be required the continued removal of burdens of sexism, lower salaries, and career impediments to achieve parity for women in general, and women of color in particular, in academic administration. The recent laxity of enforcement of affirmative action has added to the slow growth of their numbers. However, the historically black colleges can play a major role in empowerment of women of color in administrative positions.     

Intersectional Identities,Identity Dimensions,and Academic Contingencies of Self-Worth

Many people rely on academic performance as an important part of their self-concept, or have academic contingencies of self-worth. We compared academic contingencies of self-worth in three groups of participants, who varied in their feelings about two minority identities: sexual minority Asian/Pacific Islanders, straight Asian/Pacific Islanders, and sexual minority Whites. Comparing pairs of groups that shared one marginalized social identity, we confirmed our hypothesis that participants’ feelings about their racial identity related to contingent self-worth differently based on their sexuality; in contrast, participants’ feelings about their sexual identity related to contingent self-worth in the same way regardless of race. The group defined by the intersection of two minority social identities (Asian/Pacific Islander and sexual minority) is of particular interest.     

Women, AIDS, and Theatre: Representations and Resistances

The plays written about AIDS in the past dozen years form a radical canon establishing gay men as the locus for public attention. These plays have been all but silent in their representation of women with AIDS. This article examines the marginalized women in early plays such as The Normal Heart and As Is, and the women more central to later plays such as The Baltimore Waltz, Before It Hits Home, and Patient A. It foregrounds some of the most problematic issues surrounding the AIDS virus: the perception of women as vectors of disease for men and unborn children, the insistent representation of women as mothers and caregivers, and the denial of patterns of abuse, sexual exploitation, and poverty which contribute to the marginalization of woman and people of color.     

The Racial and Ethnic Microaggressions Scale (REMS): construction, reliability, and validity

Racial microaggressions are subtle statements and behaviors that unconsciously communicate denigrating messages to people of color. In recent years, a theoretical taxonomy and subsequent qualitative studies have introduced the types of microaggressions that people of color experience. In the present study, college- and Internet-based samples of African Americans, Latina/os, Asian Americans, and multiracial participants (N = 661) were used to develop and validate the Racial and Ethnic Microaggression Scale (REMS). In Study 1, an exploratory principal-components analyses (n = 443) yielded a 6-factor model: (a) Assumptions of Inferiority, (b) Second-Class Citizen and Assumptions of Criminality, (c) Microinvalidations, (d) Exoticization/Assumptions of Similarity, (e) Environmental Microaggressions, and (f) Workplace and School Microaggressions, with a Cronbach's alpha of .912 for the overall model and subscales ranging from .783 to .873. In Study 2, a confirmatory factor analysis (n = 218) supported the 6-factor model with a Cronbach's alpha of .892. Further analyses indicate that the REMS is a valid measure of racial microaggressions, as evidenced by high correlations with existing measures of racism and participants' feedback. Future research directions and implications for practice are discussed.     

Racial microaggressions in everyday life: implications for clinical practice

Racial microaggressions are brief and commonplace daily verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults toward people of color. Perpetrators of microaggressions are often unaware that they engage in such communications when they interact with racial/ethnic minorities. A taxonomy of racial microaggressions in everyday life was created through a review of the social psychological literature on aversive racism, from formulations regarding the manifestation and impact of everyday racism, and from reading numerous personal narratives of counselors (both White and those of color) on their racial/cultural awakening. Microaggressions seem to appear in three forms: microassault, microinsult, and microinvalidation. Almost all interracial encounters are prone to microaggressions; this article uses the White counselor--client of color counseling dyad to illustrate how they impair the development of a therapeutic alliance. Suggestions regarding education and training and research in the helping professions are discussed.     

Racial allyship: Novel measurement and new insights

Allies are members of an ingroup who work toward fairness for people in an outgroup. Ally behaviors include calling out discrimination and fighting for inclusion of outgroup members, and it includes public and private behaviors. As such, White allies can be an important means of reducing racism against people of color. There are few means of assessing and quantifying allyship in ingroup members, and as such, there is a need for methods for assessing allyship that can be used to better understand characteristics of allies and determine if interventions designed to reduce prejudice can improve allyship. To that end we describe an innovative scenario-based measurement technique to quantify interpersonal allyship, with White students as ingroup members (N = 987) and Black students as outgroup members (N = 61). Measurement of allyship is conducted based on participant responses to hypothetical racially-sensitive scenarios where microaggressions are occurring or likely to occur. Items were developed based focus group input, and rated by diversity experts for relevance. The factor structure of allyship items was examined by exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. The final 10-item Interpersonal Racial Allyship Scale (IRAS) was negatively correlated to 3 measures of racist attitudes and 1 measure of microaggressive behaviors, and it was positively correlated to 2 measures of outgroup liking. It also predicted making racially supportive statements in a laboratory task. We report on characteristics of allies, noting that allied behaviors are correlated with less prejudice, stronger positive feelings toward outgroup members, and a greater likelihood of having other marginalized identities. Implications of findings and applications of the scale are discussed.     

Stereotype Lift

When a negative stereotype impugns the ability or worth of an outgroup, people may experience stereotype lift—a performance boost that occurs when downward comparisons are made with a denigrated outgroup. In a meta-analytic review, members of non-stereotyped groups were found to perform better when a negative stereotype about an outgroup was linked to an intellectual test than when it was not (d=.24,p<.0001). Notably, people appear to link negative stereotypes to evaluative tests more or less automatically. Simply presenting a test as diagnostic of ability was thus sufficient to induce stereotype lift. Only when negative stereotypes were explicitly invalidated or rendered irrelevant to the test did the lift effect disappear.     

Attachment style and self-handicapping: the mediating role of the imposter phenomenon

Social Psychology of Education - Many students pursuing post-secondary education will experience the imposter phenomenon at some point in their academic career. The imposter phenomenon can lead to...     

French Children’s Awareness of Gender Stereotypes About Mathematics and Reading: When Girls Improve Their Reputation in Math

Since 2000, surveys on academic achievement show gender inequalities in favor of girls in the school setting. The aim of the present study was to examine if gender stereotypes about academic abilities that are usually considered as fully demonstrated in the literature have to be updated. Three hundred ninety-eight French fifth graders from a medium-sized provincial town answered a questionnaire designed to examine, both with direct and indirect measures, if they hold different gender stereotypes concerning mathematics and reading depending on target’s age (children vs. adults). As expected, results showed that participants, regardless of their gender, were aware of a math-ability stereotype favorable to men when the stereotyped targets were adults. When the stereotyped targets were children and young adolescents, the math-ability stereotype was less clear. Participants believed that people think that girls succeed as well as boys in math. Concerning reading-ability, participants reported the “usual” stereotype favorable to females, regardless of the stereotyped target’s age (child or adult). Together these results suggest that academic gender stereotypes have to be reconsidered. The math-ability stereotype targeting children and favorable to both genders seems to show an improvement of the French girls’ reputation in mathematics. Moreover, the reputation of French boys in this domain seems to be poorer than reported in previous research.     

A Phenomenological Investigation: Microaggressions and Counselors-in-Training

Counselor educators are charged with the responsibility of assisting counselors–in–training to gain knowledge about injustice and inequity in society. Individuals experience oppression and privilege in different ways depending on their identities of marginalized or majority status. This study examined microaggressions using written and photographic journals from 24 counselors–in–training through the lens of phenomenology. Participants identified four overarching themes in describing their experiences with microaggressions: denial, dismay, awareness, and action. Implications for training and future research are discussed.     

The Racial Microaggressions Scale (RMAS): a new scale to measure experiences of racial microaggressions in people of color

Racial microaggressions refer to the racial indignities, slights, mistreatment, or offenses that people of color may face on a recurrent or consistent basis. Racial microaggressions may represent a significant source of stress endured by people of color. The purpose of this study was to develop a scale to measure racial microaggressions. Exploratory factor analyses and confirmatory factor analyses were used to assess the dimensionality of the scale. The internal reliability, convergent validity, and concurrent validity of the scale were also explored. Results indicated that the Racial Microaggression Scale is a multidimensional tool to assess perceptions of racial microaggressions by people of color.     

Why they leave: the impact of stereotype threat on the attrition of women and minorities from science, math and engineering majors

This paper examines the effects of group performance anxiety on the attrition of women and minorities from science, math, and engineering majors. While past research has relied primarily on the academic deficits and lower socioeconomic status of women and minorities to explain their absence from these fields, we focus on the impact of stereotype threat—the anxiety caused by the expectation of being judged based on a negative group stereotype. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Freshmen, our findings indicate that minorities experience stereotype threat more strongly than whites, although women do not suffer from stereotype threat more than men. Our findings also reveal that stereotype threat has a significant positive effect on the likelihood of women, minorities, and surprisingly, white men leaving science, technology, engineering and math majors.     

Acceptability of racial microaggressions among Asian American college students: internalized model minority myth,individualism, and social conscience as correlates

ABSTRACT

How much someone finds a racial microaggression to be acceptable can vary. We focus on the acceptability of racial microaggressions among Asian American college students, in relation to cultural and religious variables. We predicted that internalized model minority stereotype and individualism will be associated with being more accepting of microaggressions. We predicted that social conscience, or the belief that the church should be active in social justice, will be associated with being less accepting of microaggressions. Results based on 102 Asian American students indicated that vertical individualism predicts greater acceptance of microaggressions, and results based on 77 Christian individuals out of the 102 participants indicated that social conscience predicts less acceptance of microaggressions. Excessive individualism may lead one to ignore the impact of racism and have a greater tolerance for microaggressions, whereas social conscience may support participation in social justice efforts, which may lead to a greater awareness of microaggressions.     

Just Because We Don't See It,Doesn't Mean It's Not There: Everyday Resistance in Psychology

This article outlines some contentions within conventional Western psychology and across the social sciences to define what counts as legitimate forms of “resistance” amongst members of historically marginalized groups (e.g. people of Color, working class/poor groups) in efforts to push back against injustice and foment social change. Without an expansion of what is understood as resistance, the discipline risks imposing narrow models and reifying deficit narratives about marginalized groups' capacity for resistance. In contexts where overt forms of resistance (e.g. marches), may lead to incarceration, deportation, death, or other egregious punishments, people located in “tight spaces” of oppression may engage in everyday off‐stage practices of resistance that are covert and not observable to those in positions of privilege or who exercise state power. This article encourages psychologists to take a political stance in solidarity with marginalized groups to acknowledge that not all forms of resistance are observable or measurable. This stance can allow psychologists to begin to dismantle deficit narratives of people mistakenly understood as being passive in the face of oppression and instead observe agency, aspirations for change, and resistance.     

Arousal and stereotype threat

Seemingly insignificant features of the context can undermine the quantitative performance of skilled females—an effect attributed to stereotype threat. The present studies tested the hypotheses that stereotype threat triggers arousal, and that attributions about that arousal could moderate the effects of stereotype threat on performance. To examine whether arousal is triggered by stereotype threat, we conducted two experiments in which female participants were asked to take a math test under conditions of stereotype threat or not. In Study 1, women under stereotype threat performed better on an easy threat-irrelevant task, but worse on a difficult threat-irrelevant task than women not under threat. In Study 2, threatened women underperformed on a math test, but this underperformance was attenuated for women directed to misattribute their arousal. These results suggest that arousal—and how arousal is attributed—may play an important role in the debilitating effects of stereotype threat.     

The Common Agenda Between Old Women,Women with Disabilities and All Women

Popular belief assumes a common agenda between old women and women with disabilities. The stereotype is that all old women are disabled and all women with disabilities may as well be old; both groups are stigmatized and marginalized, even in the feminist community. While the two groups share social invisibility and oppression, they are different in terms of their history, political goals and philosophy. Both groups desire to distance themselves from each other; those who are disabled because they have too often been warehoused into nursing homes with the old, the old who may not be disabled and don't want to face that possibility. Yet there exists compelling common ground as both groups struggle against their oppression. All women face a dual task: to confront their oppressor as well as their own internalization of that oppression. Since women with multiple oppressions are more sharply confronted with both tasks, they are on the cutting edge of the vital issues all women face. They can therefore become the teachers and heroes for all women in the common struggle for empowerment and freedom.     

Microaggressions: The experience of individuals with mental illness

The main objective of the study was to investigate the types of microaggressions experienced by individuals with mental illness (MI) based on this marginalized group status. This study included 4 focus groups, comprised of 18 individuals diagnosed with MI(es). The researchers qualitatively identified four themes (a) conveying stereotypes against individuals with MI (i.e. assumptions of inferiority, seeking attention or being dramatic, assumptions of coldness, bringing MI upon themselves, and using MI as an excuse), (b) invalidating the experience of having a MI (i.e. doubting existence, doubting severity, and avoiding acknowledgment of the MI), (c) defining a person by their disorder, and (d) misuse of terminology. Participants revealed the main perpetrators (i.e. family, friends, and professionals) of the microaggressions. The researchers discuss: how the identified themes compare to the three categories of microaggressions (i.e. microinsults, microinvalidations, and microassaults); similarities and differences between the current results and previously identified racial, gender, and sexual orientation microaggressions perpetrated in daily interactions and in therapeutic settings; and the perpetrators of microaggressions as they relate to prejudicial attitudes and social distance. Finally, the authors make recommendations for practitioners and researchers.