New Stereotype Threat research

In a previous Teaching High School Psychology post I referenced Daniel Willingham's great summary of some of the implications of the stereotype threat. Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal briefly summarized new stereotype threat research that high school psych teachers and students might find useful and provocative.

"Sunk by Stereotypes"

I haven't been able to get at the journal article yet, but according to the WSJ summary, the researchers made up a fake learning styles inventory and categories ("convex or concave learning styles" - might be just as (in)valid as auditory, visual, and kinesthetic :) and told participants that either their learning style would likely impact performance on a working memory test or that would probably have no effect. As predicted, the more strongly a participant identified with the fake learning style, the lower their test score.

This study might be easily replicable by high school students (after following ethical guidelines and getting the permissions you need in your district, of course), and students might be VERY interested in how stereotypes may be impacting their learning!

image source: http://www.photoxpress.com/stock-photos/woman/girl/man/1924891

posted by Rob McEntarffer