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Stereotype Threat Widens Achievement Gap

Summary of the Article

The article's central theme is to examine how group stereotypes impact the lives of young people at school. To illustrate how the concept of stereotype applies and affect learning, the authors, Steele, Aronson, and Spencer, took a test involving white and black students. The fact that the black students were told the test was to prove that they are less intelligent, made them perform poorly. On a second test, the black and the white students were not informed about anything concerning the nature of the test. It was apparent that both races performed equally. The article continues to indicate evidence that the black students performed minimally in the first instance since they already had a stereotype that whites are wiser than them

In a separate investigation, the author of the article assesses the perception of women regarding mathematics. In this test, a study was conducted by giving men and women a maths test, but prior to which women were warned about the complexity of the analysis. The group of women who were notified about the complex test performed poorly compared to the group of ladies who were not told anything about the test. Explaining about the outcome of these test, the authors argue that stereotype is an internal perception regarding some life issues. When a person perceives an issue following a specific framework predetermined by others, the result always tends to portray participants negative. For example, regardless of the academic ability of the black students, the performance may be lower compared to those of the white counterpart. The article continues and indicates that this because of the internal fear about the competitiveness of the white students already affect the black learners.

Within the concept of research, psychologists argue that the true nature of a human being may be affected by the perception they hold concerning their attitude issues. Some of the critical indicators of stereotypes are based on cultural affiliation and gender. For example, the above study, testing the ability women to contest in mathematics, it indicates that...