Shifting Standards of Sexuality: An Intersectional Account of Men’s Objectification of Black and White Women

Abstract

To what extent do men objectify and dehumanize Black and White women based on shifting standards of sexuality? Across five experimental studies (2 pre-registered; N = 702), White (Studies 1-4a) and Black (Study 4b) American heterosexual men evaluated a series of images of Black and White women who were either fully- or scantily-clothed, and provided ratings of sexual objectification, animalistic dehumanization, and perceived appropriateness of the image for use in advertising. Participants responded to images of fully-clothed Black women with greater sexual objectification and animalistic dehumanization, and lower appropriateness, compared to fully-clothed White women. However, scantily-clothed White women elicited greater sexual objectification and animalistic dehumanization, and lower attributions of appropriateness compared to scantily-clothed Black women. These race interactions with clothing type support a default objectification hypothesis for Black women, and a shifting standards of sexuality hypothesis for White women. An internal meta-analysis across the five experiments further supported these two hypotheses. This research illuminates the importance of examining racialized sexual objectification in terms of distinct group-specific perceptions and attributions. Implications of this intersectional account of objectification for intergroup relations are discussed.