Developing the Sense of Belonging Scale and Understanding Its Relationship to Loneliness, Need to Belong, and General Well-Being Outcomes.

The construct of belonging has played a central role in psychological theories for many years, prompting research that benefits many people. However, there is little consensus for how to measure sense of belonging. We developed an 8-item measure of belonging that is easily adapted to specific contexts. The items capture a sense of being valued, accepted, included/connected, and fitting into a social environment. Study 1 examined candidate items and facilitated item selection. Study 2 demonstrated internal consistency and convergent validity of the scale. Loneliness and belonging were inversely correlated but each made independent contributions predicting general measures of well-being. Together, they fully mediated the effect of positive social contact on three of the four well-being measures. Study 3 experimentally demonstrated the differential sensitivity of specific (belonging at your university) and global (belonging in general) forms of the scale. Participants who wrote about an experience of inclusion relevant to a specific context reported more belonging than participants who wrote about an exclusion experience, but only on the specific, and not global, scale. The measure of belonging reported here is validated in adult samples; it is a flexible tool for research on the sense of belonging, its antecedents, and consequences.

Enhancing body image satisfaction and well-being among early adolescents: Feasibility and preliminary outcomes of the mind. body. voice. program.

Although most research has emphasized high-school and college-aged women, body dissatisfaction and eating disorder behavior are also a concern for middle-school girls. We partnered with Girls Inc., a community-based organization to explore feasibility and preliminary outcomes of the mind. body. voice. (m.b.v.) program with a middle-school-aged cohort. The program was collaboratively designed with youth, focusing on body image satisfaction, disordered eating risk factors, and mental health and well-being. The work occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic, offering a unique opportunity to assess the promise of the program under difficult extenuating circumstances. In an open-trial design, we assessed change from pre- to post-program administered with two cohorts, one delivered remotely in 2020 (n = 17) and one in-person in 2021 (n = 13). Findings indicated that participation in the m.b.v. program was associated among both cohorts with significant decreases in negative body judgment and adherence to cultural appearance biases, and significant increases in body awareness, agency, and positive self-regard, as well as significant reductions in negative affect. Results support the feasibility and promise of both remote and in-person administration of the program targeting young adolescents, and in partnership with a well-established community-based organization.

Leveraging the Social Role of Dad to Change Gender Stereotypes of Men.

Trait stereotypes of men tend to be more fixed and negative than those of women. The current studies test whether stereotypes of men can be shifted through leveraging their social role as fathers. Trait attributes perceived to characterize women and moms were highly redundant, but those of men and dads were less so; moreover, men were perceived more negatively than dads, women, and moms (Study 1). Perceivers for whom the social role father was made salient rated men more similarly to dads, and no less similarly to men, and rated men more positively relative to a control condition (Study 2). Finally, among men, a threat to the category men resulted in greater opposition to benevolent social policies, but not if the social role father was primed (Study 3). Discussion focuses on positive consequences of increasing the psychological connection between men and fatherhood.

The Role of Prototype Matching in Science Pursuits: Perceptions of Scientists That Are Inaccurate and Diverge From Self-Perceptions Predict Reduced Interest in a Science Career.

Self-to-prototype matching is a strategy of mental comparisons between the self-concept and the typical or "representative" member of a group to make some judgment. Such a process might contribute to interest in pursuing a science career and, relatedly, women's underrepresentation in physical science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (pSTEM) fields. Across four studies, we measured self-scientist discrepancies on communal, agentic, and scientific dimensions, and assessed participants' interest in a science career. The most consistent predictor of science interest was the discrepancy between self and scientist on the scientific dimension (e.g., intelligent, meticulous). Study 4 established that students with larger self-scientist discrepancies also had less accurate perceptions of students pursuing science, and that inaccuracy was related to lower science interest. Thus, students with lower science interest do not just perceive scientists differently from themselves but also erroneously. Discrepancy and inaccuracy together explained a significant portion of the gender gap in pSTEM interest.

Across the thin blue line: police officers and racial bias in the decision to shoot.

Police officers were compared with community members in terms of the speed and accuracy with which they made simulated decisions to shoot (or not shoot) Black and White targets. Both samples exhibited robust racial bias in response speed. Officers outperformed community members on a number of measures, including overall speed and accuracy. Moreover, although community respondents set the decision criterion lower for Black targets than for White targets (indicating bias), police officers did not. The authors suggest that training may not affect the speed with which stereotype-incongruent targets are processed but that it does affect the ultimate decision (particularly the placement of the decision criterion). Findings from a study in which a college sample received training support this conclusion.

The effects of gender composition on women's experience in math work groups.

The present studies tested a model outlining the effects of group gender composition on self- and others' perceptions of women's math ability in a truly interactive setting with groups composed entirely of naïve participants (N = 158 4-person groups across 3 studies). One woman in each group was designated to be the "expert" by having her complete a tutorial that gave her task-relevant knowledge for a subsequent group task. Group gender composition was hypothesized to influence perceptions of women's math ability through intrapersonal processes (stereotype threat effects on performance) and interpersonal processes (social cohesion between the expert and other group members). Group composition affected the experts' performance in the group math task, but importantly, it also affected their social cohesion with group members. Moreover, both of these effects-lowered performance and poorer social cohesion in male-dominated groups-made independent contributions in accounting for group gender composition effects on perceptions of women's math ability (Studies 1 and 2). Boundary conditions were examined in a 3rd study. Women who had a history of excelling in math and had chosen a math-intensive STEM major were selected to be the designated experts. We predicted and found this would be sufficient to eliminate the effect of group gender composition on interpersonal processes, and correspondingly the effect on women's perceived math ability. Interestingly (and consistent with past work on stereotype threat effects among highly domain-identified individuals), there were continued performance differences indicative of effects on intrapersonal processes. (PsycINFO Database Record

Public Attitudes and Feelings of Warmth Toward Women and Men Experiencing Depression During the Perinatal Period.

OBJECTIVE: Depression is a major public health concern and often goes untreated. In response to a growing body of research documenting stigma as a barrier to depression care, this study focused on examining public stigma toward potentially vulnerable subpopulations. METHODS: Participants (N=241) were recruited from Amazon's Mechanical Turk and randomly assigned to provide anonymous ratings on attitudes and feelings of warmth toward pregnant women and expectant fathers experiencing depression, mothers and fathers experiencing postpartum depression, or women and men experiencing depression during nonperinatal periods. RESULTS: Participants reported significantly more negative attitudes about depressed men than women, and male participants reported significantly more negative attitudes than female participants toward depressed individuals. Similarly, participants felt significantly less warmth toward depressed men than women, and male participants expressed significantly less warmth than female participants toward depressed individuals. Male participants felt equally warm toward men and women who experienced depression during nonperinatal periods, whereas female participants felt significantly warmer toward women who experienced depression during nonperinatal periods compared with men. CONCLUSIONS: Results indicate that the public views depressed men more negatively than depressed women and that males are more likely to hold stigmatizing attitudes toward depression, suggesting the importance of reducing stigma directed toward men with depression and stigma held by men toward persons with depression. Attitudes and feelings toward depressed individuals did not consistently vary by perinatal status. These findings are an initial step in improving depression treatment engagement strategies and in identifying those who would benefit most from stigma reduction programs.

Psychological essentialism, gender, and parenthood: Physical transformation leads to heightened essentialist conceptions.

Psychological essentialism is the tendency to view entities as if they have an underlying, often invisible essence that makes them what they are (Medin & Ortony, 1989), and the presence of a genetic basis for group membership contributes to such conceptions (Dar-Nimrod & Heine, 2011; Keller, 2005). We argue that undergoing visually salient physical transformations in the process of becoming a group member leads to particularly heightened essentialist conceptions. We test this idea in the context of parenthood. Public discourse suggests the category mother is imbued with special properties and is viewed as a deeper, more lasting, and real category than father. Such perceptions may contribute to unequal work outcomes for women relative to men. Collectively, the 5 studies reported show that mothers are perceived in more essentialist terms than fathers, and that physical changes women undergo in the process of becoming mothers play a substantial role in producing this difference. Moreover, viewing mothers as a particularly natural and real category predicted judgments that women struggle to successfully manage their roles as mothers and professionals, but only when motherhood was biological in nature. The role that observable physical transformations may play in the reification of categories is discussed.

Seeing Red: Anger Increases How Much Republican Identification Predicts Partisan Attitudes and Perceived Polarization.

We examined the effects of incidental anger on perceived and actual polarization between Democrats and Republicans in the context of two national tragedies, Hurricane Katrina (Study 1) and the mass shooting that targeted Representative Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona (Study 2). We hypothesized that because of its relevance to intergroup conflict, incidental anger exacerbates the political polarization effects of issue partisanship (the correlation between partisan identification and partisan attitudes), and, separately, the correlation between conservative partisan identification and perceived polarization between Democrats and Republicans. We further hypothesized that these effects would be strongest for Republican identification because Republican leaders were targets of public criticism in both tragedies and because conservative (Republican) ideology tends to be more sensitive to threat. In the studies, participants first completed an emotion induction procedure by recalling autobiographical events that made them angry (Studies 1 & 2), sad (Studies 1 & 2), or that involved recalling emotionally neutral events (Study 2). Participants later reported their attitudes regarding the two tragedies, their perceptions of the typical Democrat's and Republican's attitudes on those issues, and their identification with the Democratic and Republican parties. Compared with incidental sadness (Studies 1 and 2) and a neutral condition (Study 2), incidental anger exacerbated the associations between Republican identification and partisan attitudes, and, separately between Republican identification and perceived polarization between the attitudes of Democrats and Republicans. We discuss implications for anger's influence on political attitude formation and perceptions of group differences in political attitudes.

Measuring intergroup ideologies: positive and negative aspects of emphasizing versus looking beyond group differences.

Research on interethnic relations has focused on two ideologies, asking whether it is best to de-emphasize social-category differences (colorblind) or emphasize and celebrate differences (multicultural). We argue each of these can manifest with negative outgroup evaluations: Assimilationism demands that subordinate groups adopt dominant group norms to minimize group distinctions; segregationism holds that groups should occupy separate spheres. Parallel versions can be identified for intergender relations. Scales to measure all four ideologies are developed both for ethnicity (Studies 1 and 2) and gender (Studies 3 and 4). Results demonstrate that the ideologies can be reliably measured, that the hypothesized four-factor models are superior to alternative models with fewer factors, and that the ideologies relate as predicted to the importance ascribed to group distinctions, subordinate group evaluations, and solution preferences for intergroup conflict scenarios. We argue that this fourfold model can help clarify theory and measurement, allowing a more nuanced assessment of ideological attitudes.

The police officer's dilemma: using ethnicity to disambiguate potentially threatening individuals.

Using a simple videogame, the effect of ethnicity on shoot/don't shoot decisions was examined. African American or White targets, holding guns or other objects, appeared in complex backgrounds. Participants were told to "shoot" armed targets and to "not shoot" unarmed targets. In Study 1, White participants made the correct decision to shoot an armed target more quickly if the target was African American than if he was White, but decided to "not shoot" an unarmed target more quickly if he was White. Study 2 used a shorter time window, forcing this effect into error rates. Study 3 replicated Study 1's effects and showed that the magnitude of bias varied with perceptions of the cultural stereotype and with levels of contact, but not with personal racial prejudice. Study 4 revealed equivalent levels of bias among both African American and White participants in a community sample. Implications and potential underlying mechanisms are discussed.

Oppositional identities: dissimilarities in how women and men experience parent versus professional roles.

As stereotypes of social groups undergo change, group members gain access to previously denied social and cultural roles. Although such access is desirable, to the extent that the behavior, traits, and attitudes required to succeed in a new role are in opposition to those required to do well in a still-valued old role, conflict in the self-concept may ensue. Specifically, the individual must necessarily fall short in social comparisons of the self to the ideal group member in 1 or both roles, threatening self-integrity. Examining the specific case of oppositional identities between career and mom roles, we argue that women respond to this conflict by shifting back and forth between activation of whichever identity is relevant in a given situational context in a way that men do not. This shifting of self-associations is hypothesized to deplete scarce cognitive resources, interfering with performance on a task that requires executive function capacity. In addition, to the extent the identities are viewed as trading off against one another, failure in 1 domain may be responded to by activating the alternate identity in an effort to restore self-integrity, again in a way that is not true for men. These hypotheses are explored across 4 studies, utilizing both college students in the midst of formulating--and working parents in the midst of negotiating--these identities.

Dangerous Enough: Moderating Racial Bias with Contextual Threat Cues.

Research shows that participants shoot armed Blacks more frequently and quickly than armed Whites, but make don't-shoot responses more frequently and quickly for unarmed Whites than unarmed Blacks. We argue that this bias reflects the perception of threat - specifically, threat associated with Black males. Other danger cues (not just race) may create a similar predisposition to shoot, and if these cues promote shooting when the target is White, they should attenuate racial bias. We embedded targets in threatening andsafe backgrounds. Racial bias was evident in safe contexts but disappeared when context signaled danger, and this reduction was largely due to an increased tendency to shoot White targets.

Contextual Variation in Automatic Evaluative Bias to Racially-Ambiguous Faces.

Three studies examined the implicit evaluative associations activated by racially-ambiguous Black-White faces. In the context of both Black and White faces, Study 1 revealed a graded pattern of bias against racially-ambiguous faces that was weaker than the bias to Black faces but stronger than that to White faces. Study 2 showed that significant bias was present when racially-ambiguous faces appeared in the context of only White faces, but not in the context of only Black faces. Study 3 demonstrated that context produces perceptual contrast effects on racial-prototypicality judgments. Racially-ambiguous faces were perceived as more prototypically Black in a White-only than mixed-race context, and less prototypically Black in a Black-only context. Conversely, they were seen as more prototypically White in a Black-only than mixed context, and less prototypically White in a White-only context. The studies suggest that both race-related featural properties within a face (i.e., racial ambiguity) and external contextual factors affect automatic evaluative associations.

A model of the ingroup as a social resource.

Drawing on theories of social comparison, realistic group conflict, and social identity, we present an integrative model designed to describe the psychological utility of social groups. We review diverse motivations that group membership may satisfy (e.g., the need for acceptance or ideological consensus) and attempt to link these particular needs to a global concern for self-worth. We then examine several factors hypothesized to influence an ingroup's utility in the eyes of its members. Attempting to unite our understanding of (a) why groups are needed and (b) what kinds of groups are useful in meeting those needs, a proposed model of the ingroup as a social resource (MISR) suggests that the dimensions of perceived value, entitativity, and identification interact to determine the overall psychological utility of an ingroup. We discuss empirical and theoretical support for this model, as well as its implications for intra- and intergroup attitudes.

Rethinking the link between categorization and prejudice within the social cognition perspective.

For the past 40 years, social psychological research on stereotyping and prejudice in the United States has been dominated by the social cognition perspective, which has emphasized the important role of basic categorization processes in intergroup dynamics. An inadvertent consequence of this approach has been a disproportionate focus on social categorization as a causal factor in intergroup animosity and, accordingly, an emphasis on approaches that minimize category distinctions as the solution to intergroup conflict. Though recognizing the crucial function of categorization, we question existing support for the hypothesis that the perception of strong group differences necessarily results in greater intergroup bias. Given that it is neither feasible nor ultimately desirable to imagine that social categories can be eliminated, we suggest that a more useful approach is one that promotes intergroup harmony even while recognizing and valuing the distinctions that define our social world.