STEMMING THE TIDE:

Coping with Stereotype Threat In Math & Science Learning

Matthew S. McGloneDepartment of Communication Studies

The University of Texas at Austinmatthew_mcglone@mail.utexas.edu

Prejudices, it is well known, are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never been fertilized by education; they grow there, firm as weeds among the rocks.

- Charlotte Bronte (1851)

I told my literary agent I want to help middle-school girls stay interested in math and be good at it, and see it as friendly and accessible and not this scary thing. Everyone else in society tells them it's not for them. It's for nerdy white guys with pocket protectors. This is how 75 percent of all science is depicted on television.

The message they're getting instead is: It's really cool to be dumb. Look at Jessica Simpson. She's famous for being dumb. I guess it started with Marilyn Monroe, and she actually wasn't that dumb, but that's how she was perceived -- and that's what got popular.

- Danica McKellar (2007)

Underachievement of Black and Latino Students

Post-education: overrepresented in US Prison Post-education: overrepresented in US Prison population; clear link to underperformancepopulation; clear link to underperformance

in schoolin school

College: approximately 1/2 as likely to go as College: approximately 1/2 as likely to go as European American students; about 2x as European American students; about 2x as

likely to drop out if they dolikely to drop out if they do

High School: high drop out rates; no High School: high drop out rates; no improvement since No Child Left Behindimprovement since No Child Left Behind

K-12: Lower standardized test scores and K-12: Lower standardized test scores and grades; gap widens as students grades; gap widens as students

move through schoolmove through school

Underachievement of Girls and Women in STEM Education

Graduate School: while outperforming men in all other Graduate School: while outperforming men in all other areas of academia, women earn less than 25% of areas of academia, women earn less than 25% of

advanced degrees in STEM fieldsadvanced degrees in STEM fields

College: women perform worse on standardized tests College: women perform worse on standardized tests of mathematics but do well in their courses; far fewer of mathematics but do well in their courses; far fewer

choose STEM majorschoose STEM majors

Middle School: girls earn equally high grades but Middle School: girls earn equally high grades but begin to lose confidence in math abilities; test score begin to lose confidence in math abilities; test score

gap on standardized tests emergesgap on standardized tests emerges

K-12: girls perform at or above the same level as boys K-12: girls perform at or above the same level as boys on tests and in school, but show less intrinsic interest on tests and in school, but show less intrinsic interest in spatial tasks and hypothetico-deductive reasoningin spatial tasks and hypothetico-deductive reasoning

Common Explanations for Ethnic Academic Achievement Gaps

Common Explanations for Ethnic Academic Achievement Gaps

1. Lower innate intelligence of ethnic minorities

– Rushton (1984): more offspring / less nurturing low intelligence

– Herrnstein & Murray (1989): The Bell Curve

– DNA pioneer James Watson (2008): “Gloomy prospects for Africa”

Common Explanations for Ethnic Academic Achievement Gaps

1. Lower innate intelligence of ethnic minorities

– Rushton (1984): more offspring / less nurturing low intelligence

– Herrnstein & Murray (1989): The Bell Curve

– DNA pioneer James Watson (2008): “Gloomy prospects for Africa”

2. Poverty lower skills and preparation

Common Explanations for Ethnic Academic Achievement Gaps

1. Lower innate intelligence of ethnic minorities

– Rushton (1984): more offspring / less nurturing low intelligence

– Herrnstein & Murray (1989): The Bell Curve

– DNA pioneer James Watson (2008): “Gloomy prospects for Africa”

2. Poverty lower skills and preparation

3. Cultures that encourage anti-intellectualism, characterize academic success as “acting white”

Common Explanations for Sex-Based

STEM Achievement Gaps

Common Explanations for Sex-Based

STEM Achievement Gaps 1. Biology

• Geary (1998): evolutionary pressures yield sexual dimorphism in reasoning and communication abilities

• Baron-Cohen (2001): prenatal testosterone levels shape male (systemizing) vs. female (empathizing) brains

Common Explanations for Sex-Based

STEM Achievement Gaps 1. Biology

• Geary (1998): evolutionary pressures yield sexual dimorphism in reasoning and communication abilities • Baron-Cohen (2001): prenatal testosterone levels shape male (systemizing) vs. female (empathizing) brains

2. Socialization• McGillicuddy-De Lisi (1998): girls receive less encouragement to pursue STEM studies than boys

Common Explanations for Sex-Based

STEM Achievement Gaps 1. Biology

• Geary (1998): evolutionary pressures yield sexual dimorphism in reasoning and communication abilities • Baron-Cohen (2001): prenatal testosterone levels shape male (systemizing) vs. female (empathizing) brains

2. Socialization• McGillicuddy-De Lisi (1998): girls receive less encouragement to pursue STEM studies than boys

3. Nature-Nurture Interaction• “…by nature implanted, for nurture to enlarge” (Merchant Taylor’s School Headmaster Richard Mulcaster, 1581)

Human intelligence is among the most fragile things in nature. It doesn’t take much to distract it, suppress it, or even annihilate it.

– Neil Postman (1990)

• Interpersonal “chemistry” – rapport affects intellectual engagement in conversation; the more

comfortable we are in another’s presence, the more witty we appear to them and to observers (McGlone & Aronson, 1997)

Social Factors Influence Intellectual Performance

• Interpersonal “chemistry” – rapport affects intellectual engagement in conversation; the more

comfortable we are in another’s presence, the more witty we appear to them and to observers (McGlone & Aronson, 1997)

• Self-presentational concerns– evaluation apprehension (Cottrell, 1972)

Social Factors Influence Intellectual Performance

• Interpersonal “chemistry” – rapport affects intellectual engagement in conversation; the more

comfortable we are in another’s presence, the more witty we appear to them and to observers (McGlone & Aronson, 1997)

• Self-presentational concerns– evaluation apprehension (Cottrell, 1972)

• Self-fulfilling prophecies– Pygmalion Effect: Students’ academic performance influenced by

teachers’ positive or negative expectations (Rosenthal, 1968)– Stereotype / Social Identity Threat

Social Factors Influence Intellectual Performance

Psychological discomfort people experience when they are concerned about a) being judged in terms of a negative social or personal stereotype or b) doing something that would inadvertently confirm the stereotype.

Stereotype/Social IdentityThreat

stereotypeis salient

apprehension,distraction

intellectualdisruption

resemblestereotype

Stereotype Threat Scenarios

black students making class presentation to white students, teachergirls, women taking math tests

men pursuingnursing degrees

male prof lecturing on sexist communication at Bryn Mawr

Stereotype Threat Scenarios

The “Tongue-Tied Technocrat” Stereotype Threat Hypothesis (Fallows, 2004; Aronson & McGlone, 2008)

Dan Quayle, 1992 George W. Bush, 2008

Stereotype Threat and Speech Anxiety

…in 1994, Bush was eloquent. He spoke quickly and easily. He rattled off complicated sentences and brought them to the right grammatical conclusions. He mishandled a word or two, but fewer than most people would in an hour's debate. More striking, he did not pause before forcing out big words, as he so often does now, or invent mangled new ones. (James Fallows, Atlantic Monthly, 2004).

Bush-Richards Debate, 1994 Bush-Kerry Debates, 2004

Stereotype Threat and Academic Achievement

• ST is a situational phenomenon that can account for a significant portion of ethnic and gender gaps in test performance and academic achievement.

• ST elicited by cues operating in the classroom and/or testing context.

Cues to Stereotype Threat: Test Framing

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Verbal Ability Class Exercise

Test Description

Racial Differences in Verbal Performance

White

Black

Steele & Aronson (1995)Steele & Aronson (1995)Journal of Personality and Social PsychologyJournal of Personality and Social Psychology

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Math Ability ProblemSolving

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Gender Differences in Math Performance

Men

Women

Johns, Schmader, & Martens (2005)Johns, Schmader, & Martens (2005)Psychological SciencePsychological Science

Cues to Stereotype Threat: Identity Salience

woman Latina daughter sister aunt Houstonian UT student biology major athlete girlfriend

Situationally salientidentity can boostor impair intellectualperformance

AscribedVs.

AchievedIdentities

Vandenberg Mental Rotation Test (MRT)

• produces largest documented gender gap in any cognitive ability (Halpern, 1992; De Lisi, 2001)

• a meta-analysis containing 286 data sets and 100,000 participants found a highly significant male advantage for mental rotation (d = .9); this pattern remains stable across age and has decreased little in recent years.

Identity Salience Influences Women’s Mental Rotation Performance

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GENDER "ELITE COLLEGE" STUDENT CONTROL

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WOMEN

MEN

McGlone & Aronson (2006). Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology.

Identity Salience Influences Women’s Mental Rotation Performance

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GENDER "ELITE COLLEGE" STUDENT CONTROL

MR

T S

CO

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WOMEN

MEN

McGlone & Aronson (2006). Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology.

Identity Salience Influences Women’s Mental Rotation Performance

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GENDER "ELITE COLLEGE" STUDENT CONTROL

MR

T

SC

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WOMEN

MEN

McGlone & Aronson (2006). Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology.

Cues to Stereotype Threat: Recent Exposure to Stereotype Info.

Effects on Women’s Leadership Preference

Davies, Spencer, Quinn, & Gerhardstein (2002) Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin Davies, Spencer, & Steele (2005) Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

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Neutral Stereotypic

Subordinate role

Leadership role

TV Commercials

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Neutral Stereotypic

Language careers

Math careers

Effects on Women’s Career Preferences

TV Commercials

Cues to Stereotype Threat• Framing assessment as a measure of ability• Stigmatized social identities made salient• Recent exposure to stereotype information

ST effects shown for:• All educational levels (elementary, middle, high

school, college)• ethnic minorities AND majorities targeted by negative

intellectual stereotypes• girls, women in STEM learning contexts

Conclusions from ~ 200 Published Studies on Stereotype Threat

• Impairment occurs both on tests and in terms of GPA

• Impairment on tests results from anxiety, reduced working

memory capacity; impaired self-regulation; not typically a

function of giving up

• fMRI studies show that threat elicits high amygdala activation

• Can affect elite or non-elite students

• Can arise as a function of simply mixing students

• Leads women to express less interest in math and science, and

even bifurcate their identities

Strategies for Reducing Stereotype Threat in STEM Learning

Reducing Stereotype ThreatSolution 1: Provide Role Models

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Male Tutor /Adminstrator

Female Tutor /Adminstrator

MenWomen

Marx & Roman (2002)Marx & Roman (2002)Personality and Social Psychology BulletinPersonality and Social Psychology Bulletin

Reducing Stereotype ThreatSolution 2: Threat Inoculation through Education

• Train our educators to be ‘wise mentors’– discuss, challenge stereotypes among students– set high standards but assure students that they can meet them

• Emphasizing skill over ability– highlight that learning is an incremental process

• Fostering a sense of belonging – help students reappraise the meaning of adversity

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End of the Year

Math Test Performance

Intelligence isIncremental

ExperiencingDifficulty is

Normal

Control

Type of Intervention

Males

Females

Good, Aronson, & Inzlicht (2003) Good, Aronson, & Inzlicht (2003) Applied Developmental PsychologyApplied Developmental Psychology

Reducing Stereotype ThreatSolution 2: Threat Inoculation through Education

Reducing Stereotype ThreatSolution 2: Threat Inoculation through Education • Teaching our educators to be ‘wise mentors’

– speak out against the stereotype– set high standards but assure students that they can meet them

• Emphasizing skill over ability– highlight that learning is an incremental process

• Fostering a sense of belonging – help students reappraise the meaning of adversity

• Unveiling the effects of stereotype threat– point out that stereotype threat is an external explanation for anxiety

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Math Ability Test

Problem SolvingTask

Math AbilityTest + STBriefing

Men

Women

Teaching about Stereotype Threat Inoculates Students Against Its Effects

McGlone & Aronson (2007).McGlone & Aronson (2007). Communication Education Communication Education

Reducing Stereotype ThreatSolution 3: Recognize that Standardized Tests

are Two-Way Communication Channels

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Inquiry Before Inquiry After

AP

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Female

Male

ETS Study: Asking Gender Before AP Calculus Test Hurts Girls, Helps Boys (Stricker, 2004)

Danaher and Crandall (2008)Reanalysis of Stricker’s data

“Female students benefited substantially on the calculus test when demographics were asked after testing rather than before. This simple, small, and inexpensive change could increase U.S. girls receiving AP Calculus credit by more than 4,700 every year” (p. 293).

Implications For our Work as Teachers

• Understand and teach students that intelligence,

performance, motivation are fragile; learn to expect

ups and downs

• Teach students that their abilities can expand

• Expose students to role models who, like them,

experience difficulties but overcome• Use cooperative group work; reduce competition• Give feedback in ways that don’t undermine

motivation; high standards and support to meet standards

Comments and questions are welcome! Please send them to:

Matt McGloneDepartment of Communication StudiesThe University of Texas at Austin1 University Station A1105Austin, TX 78712e-mail: matthew_mcglone@mail.utexas.edu Phone: 512-471-1920

Thanks!