Self-to-stereotype matching and musical taste: Is there a link between self-to-stereotype similarity and self-rated music-genre preferences?

Abstract

Musical taste is believed to function as a social “badge” of identity that might develop according to a process of “self-to-stereotype matching”. For this reason, individuals were expected to like musical styles that are stereotypically associated with fans that were similar to them. Three studies, each using a different measure of self-to-stereotype similarity, found that similarity to stereotypical music fans correlated significantly with participants’ self-rated musical tastes. These findings suggested individuals were more likely to prefer a musical style if they were similar, or at least perceived themselves similar, to the stereotypical fans associated with that musical style. In all three studies, evidence was also found to suggest that an individual’s similarity to stereotypical music fans might be used to predict their favourite musical style. Together these findings are argued to offer support for the idea that a process of self-to-stereotype matching might influence how individual musical tastes are formed, although alternate interpretations of this link between self-identity and musical taste (i.e., self-stereotyping) cannot be ruled out without further investigation.