Stereotype threat as an antecedent to domain identification and achievement in language arts in boys: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

A substantial number of experimental studies on stereotype threat explores performance of girls in mathematics. Only few concentrated on gender differences favoring girls in language performance. However, gender differences in a reading test in the Program for International Student Assessment are three times larger than in mathematics. Considerable research indicates that gender differences in achievement and academic attitudes are partly explained by stereotype threat. In this study, using structural equation modeling on representative data from a sample of schoolboys in three age cohorts, we examined the associations of repeated experiences of stereotype threat and two outcome variables: language achievement and domain identification with language arts. We demonstrated that working memory and intellectual helplessness were predicted by the level of stereotype threat. Moving beyond past work, we showed that the indirect effect explaining domain identification through intellectual helplessness was significant in older cohorts. Additionally, the indirect effect linking stereotype threat and language achievement through working memory was not significant in the oldest cohort. In this group, language identification significantly predicted language achievement. These results offer a tentative support of our prediction about a cumulative effect of stereotype threat on domain identification. The present study enriches a small but growing body of literature examining stereotype threat in male samples. Moreover, it identifies a new mediational path by which stereotype threat may be translated into lower domain identification and in turn lower language achievement.