Mixed Race Studies

A hidden bias against interracial couples

The Seattle Times
2016-09-23

Allison Skinner, Postdoctoral Researcher
Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences
University of Washington

Although most white Americans self-report little to no racial bias against black people, they tend to show robust implicit, or unconscious, biases.

NEXT year marks the 50th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that found laws banning interracial marriage to be unconstitutional. Although polls indicate that acceptance of interracial marriage has increased dramatically since then, incidents of prejudice and violence against interracial couples continue.

In April, a Mississippi landlord evicted a family after he found out the couple was interracial. Then in August, a man stabbed an interracial couple in Olympia after seeing them kiss in public.

As a social psychologist, I wondered if these types of incidents are aberrations or indications of a persistent underlying bias against interracial couples.

Read the entire article here.

Study finds bias, disgust toward mixed-race couples

UW Today
2016-08-17

Deborah Bach

Interracial marriage has grown in the United States over the past few decades, and polls show that most Americans are accepting of mixed-race relationships.

A 2012 study by the Pew Research Center found that interracial marriages in the U.S. had doubled between 1980 and 2010 to about 15 percent, and just 11 percent of respondents disapproved of interracial marriage.

But new research from the University of Washington suggests that reported acceptance of interracial marriage masks deeper feelings of discomfort — even disgust — that some feel about mixed-race couples. Published online in July in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology and co-authored by UW postdoctoral researcher Caitlin Hudac, the study found that bias against interracial couples is associated with disgust that in turn leads interracial couples to be dehumanized…

Read the entire article here.

“Yuck, you disgust me!” Affective bias against interracial couples

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology
Volume 68, January 2017
pages 68–77
DOI: 10.1016/j.jesp.2016.05.008

Allison L. Skinner, Postdoctoral Researcher
University of Washington

Caitlin M. Hudac, Senior Post-doctoral Fellow
University of Washington

Highlights

• Bias against interracial romance is correlated with self-reported feelings of disgust.
• Interracial couples elicit a neural disgust response among observers – as indicated by increased insula activation.
• Manipulating state disgust leads to implicit dehumanization of interracial couples.
• Findings suggest that meaningful social units (e.g., couples) influence person perception.

The current research expands upon the sparse existing literature on the nature of bias against interracial couples. Study 1 demonstrates that bias against interracial romance is correlated with disgust. Study 2 provides evidence that images of interracial couples evoke a neural disgust response among observers – as indicated by increased insula activation relative to images of same-race couples. Consistent with psychological theory indicating that disgust leads to dehumanization, Study 3 demonstrates that manipulating disgust leads to implicit dehumanization of interracial couples. Overall, the current findings provide evidence that interracial couples elicit disgust and are dehumanized relative to same-race couples. These findings are particularly concerning, given evidence of antisocial reactions (e.g., aggression, perpetration of violence) to dehumanized targets. Findings also highlight the role of meaningful social units (e.g., couples) in person perception, an important consideration for psychologists conducting social cognition research.

Read or purchase the article here.

Looking Black or Looking Back? Using Phenotype and Ancestry to Make Racial Categorizations

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology
Available online: 2014-12-01
DOI: 10.1016/j.jesp.2014.11.011

Allison L. Skinner
Department of Psychology
University of Nebraska, Lincoln

Gandalf Nicolas
Department of Psychology
College of William & Mary, Williamsburg, Virginia

Highlights

• We examine effects of racial ancestry and phenotypicality on race categorization.
• Both factors influence categorization, but phenotipicality effects are larger.
• Low Black phenotypicality targets were perceived as warmer and more competent.
• Bias against low Black phenotypicality targets was perceived as less discriminatory.
• All biracial targets were categorized as biracial.

When it comes to the racial categorization of biracial individuals, do people look at phenotypicality (i.e., a race consistent appearance) for clues, or do they look back at racial ancestry? We manipulated racial ancestry and racial phenotypicality (using morphed photos) to investigate their influence on race categorizations. Results indicated that while ancestry and phenotypicality information both influenced deliberate racial categorization, phenotypicality had a substantially larger effect. We also investigated how these factors influenced perceptions of warmth and competence, and racial discrimination. We found that Black-White biracials with low Black phenotypicality were perceived as warmer and more competent than biracial targets with moderate and high Black phenotypicality. Moreover, given identical instances of racially discriminatory treatment, low Black racial phenotypicality targets were significantly less likely to be perceived as victims of racial discrimination. Our findings shed light on how ancestry and phenotype influence perceptions of race and real world social judgments such as perceptions of discrimination. Previous studies have shown that low minority ancestry biracials are presumed to have experienced less discrimination, our findings indicate that racial cues impact perceptions of discrimination even in incidences of known racial discrimination.

Read or purchase the article here.