Gender and racial stereotypes in impression formation and social decision-making processes

Abstract

Subjects who differed on relevant measures of prejudice examined photographs and trait descriptions of job candidates. Gender or racial stereotypes were cued by the photographs of the applicants, and to assess the impact of individuating information on stereotype use, the trait description concerning the applicants were manipulated so that they were either primarily stereotype-consistent, stereotype-inconsistent, or neutral. After forming an impression of each applicant, subjects completed a number of evaluative trait ratings, a liking measure, and two process-oriented measures — an information search task and a recall measure. The counter-stereotypic hiring recommendations were not mediated by the impression formed of the candidate, suggesting self-presentational concerns influenced these judgments; hiring choices were based solely on the photograph in the gender case, and on both the photograph and traits in the race case. On the evaluative trait ratings, subjects appeared relatively uninfluenced by the stereotype, although the more subtle process-oriented measures showed effects that are consistent with stereotype-guided processing. Based on the results, a model of the role of stereotypes in social decision-making is presented.