Understanding Diversity Ideologies From the Target's Perspective: A Review and Future Directions

We present a review of the diversity ideologies literature from the target's perspective. In particular, we focus on how diversity ideologies—beliefs or organizational practices with regards to how to approach diversity—affect racial minorities' and women's self-perceptions and experiences at work. This review suggests that a diversity aware ideology (i.e., multiculturalism) is more beneficial than a diversity blind ideology (i.e., colorblindness) for racial-ethnic minorities (e.g., better performance outcomes; more psychological engagement, inclusion, and workplace satisfaction; more positive leadership self-perceptions; and reduced perceptions of bias and turnover intentions). In contrast, for women, gender-blindness is associated with more positive outcomes than gender awareness (e.g., enhanced self-confidence, pro-active behaviors and leadership emergence). Importantly, multiculturalism and gender-blindness can both produce negative side effects for racial minorities and women, respectively, which highlights the importance of developing approaches to address the shortcomings of these conventional ideologies. We discuss the implications and offer recommendations for future research

How Organizational Responses to Sexual Harassment Claims Shape Public Perception

Sexual harassment remains pervasive in the workplace. Complementing past research examining the intra-organizational effects of sexual harassment, this paper investigates its extra-organizational consequences by considering reputational damage organizations can suffer from sexual harassment claims. Four experiments (NTotal = 1,534) show that even a single sexual harassment claim can damage public perception of gender equality of an organization, which reduces organizational attractiveness. However, an organizational response characterized by proactive consideration of the claimant (compared to no mention of sexual harassment, mention of sexual harassment with no response, or a minimizing response to a sexual harassment claim) fully restores, and sometimes even increases, public perceptions of the organization’s commitment to due process and gender equality. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.</p

The divided states of America:How the 2016 US presidential election shaped perceived levels of gender equality.

When Barack Obama became the first Black American to be elected president of the United States, many claimed that a “postracial” society had been achieved. Analogously, we predicted that the election of a first woman president—that is, a Hillary Clinton victory—would increase perceptions of gender equality in the United States. In contrast, we predicted that a Donald Trump victory would decrease perceived gender equality. Pre- and postelection data revealed that perceived gender equality indeed decreased immediately after Election Day, but only for those who preferred Clinton over Trump—thus increasing polarization between Trump and Clinton supporters on gender-related issues. In an experimental study using a fictitious election, we found that both the winner’s gender and sexism of the man candidate contributed, independently, to perceived gender inequality. These two studies demonstrate how prominent events, such as political elections, can shape people’s perceived levels of systemic inequality. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed

The divided states of America:How the 2016 US presidential election shaped perceived levels of gender equality.

When Barack Obama became the first Black American to be elected president of the United States, many claimed that a “postracial” society had been achieved. Analogously, we predicted that the election of a first woman president—that is, a Hillary Clinton victory—would increase perceptions of gender equality in the United States. In contrast, we predicted that a Donald Trump victory would decrease perceived gender equality. Pre- and postelection data revealed that perceived gender equality indeed decreased immediately after Election Day, but only for those who preferred Clinton over Trump—thus increasing polarization between Trump and Clinton supporters on gender-related issues. In an experimental study using a fictitious election, we found that both the winner’s gender and sexism of the man candidate contributed, independently, to perceived gender inequality. These two studies demonstrate how prominent events, such as political elections, can shape people’s perceived levels of systemic inequality. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed

Think leader, think white? Capturing and weakening an implicit pro-white leadership bias.

Across four studies, we found evidence for an implicit pro-White leadership bias that helps explain the underrepresentation of ethnic minorities in leadership positions. Both White-majority and ethnic minority participants reacted significantly faster when ethnically White names and leadership roles (e.g., manager; Study 1) or leadership traits (e.g., decisiveness; Study 2 &amp; 3) were paired in an Implicit Association Test (IAT) rather than when ethnic minority names and leadership traits were paired. Moreover, the implicit pro-White leadership bias showed discriminant validity with the conventional implicit bias measures (Study 3). Importantly, results showed that the pro-White leadership bias can be weakened when situational cues increase the salience of a dual identity (Study 4). This, in turn, can diminish the explicit pro-White bias in promotion related decision making processes (Study 4). This research offers a new tool to measure the implicit psychological processes underlying the underrepresentation of ethnic minorities in leadership positions and proposes interventions to weaken such biases

Procedure of the Ethnicity-Organizational Roles IAT (Study 1).

<p><i>Note.</i> IAT =  Implicit Association Test.</p