The Briefing Room

General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: Wingnut on December 01, 2018, 01:21:36 pm

Title: White liberals dumb themselves down when they speak to black people, a new study contends
Post by: Wingnut on December 01, 2018, 01:21:36 pm

By Isaac Stanley-Becker November 30
You have recently joined a book club.

Before each meeting, one member of the literary collective sends an email to the club secretary offering a few thoughts on the assigned text. This month, it’s your turn to compose the brief review.

A new study suggests that the words you use may depend on whether the club secretary’s name is Emily (“a stereotypically White name,” as the study says) or Lakisha (“a stereotypically Black name”). If you’re a white liberal writing to Emily, you might use words like “melancholy” or “euphoric” to describe the mood of the book, whereas you might trade these terms out for the simpler “sad” or “happy” if you’re corresponding with Lakisha.

But if you’re a white conservative, your diction won’t depend on the presumed race of your interlocutor.

This racial and political disparity is among the discoveries made by a pair of social psychologists in a paper forthcoming in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the American Psychological Association. Cydney Dupree, an assistant professor of organizational behavior at the Yale School of Management, and Susan Fiske, a professor of psychology and public affairs at Princeton, documented what they call a “competence downshift” exhibited by white liberals in interactions with racial minorities, and with black people in particular.

The findings, based on what the authors stress is “preliminary evidence,” raise difficult questions about aspirations for a so-called post-racial society. The results reveal how subtle forms of discrimination may coincide with progress toward equal treatment, or what the paper identifies as “a significant reduction in the expression of explicit prejudice and endorsement of negative stereotypes.”

The psychologists further discovered that white liberals rarely admit to the goal of appearing less competent, a fact that highlights the role of implicit bias and “the covert nature of the competence downshift strategy.”

“White liberals may unwittingly draw on negative stereotypes, dumbing themselves down in a likely well-meaning, ‘folksy,’ but ultimately patronizing, attempt to connect with the outgroup,” argues the paper, titled “Self-Presentation in Interracial Settings: The Competence Downshift by White Liberals.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/pb/nation/2018/11/30/white-liberals-dumb-themselves-down-when-they-speak-black-people-new-study-contends/?outputType=accessibility&nid=menu_nav_accessibilityforscreenreader (https://www.washingtonpost.com/pb/nation/2018/11/30/white-liberals-dumb-themselves-down-when-they-speak-black-people-new-study-contends/?outputType=accessibility&nid=menu_nav_accessibilityforscreenreader)

Sorry... (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaDQ1vIuvZI#)

Title: Re: White liberals dumb themselves down when they speak to black people, a new study contends
Post by: mountaineer on December 01, 2018, 01:34:13 pm

Not at all surprising. The left shows very little respect for most people, and especially African-Americans.

Title: Re: White liberals dumb themselves down when they speak to black people, a new study contends
Post by: Sighlass on December 01, 2018, 02:26:43 pm

Years ago, I ran across a little ditty in this vein about how survey people avoided interviewing mixed groups because often whites would just agree with blacks to keep from appearing controversial.

I will see if I can dig up the article.

http://www.jewishworldreview.com/0706/prager071106.php3?printer_friendly (http://www.jewishworldreview.com/0706/prager071106.php3?printer_friendly)