Research Starter Grant: Understanding Interracial Interactions: How Situational Cues Influence Cognition, Affect, and Behavior During Intergroup Contact

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Intellectual Merit. Five experimental studies test causal hypotheses about how the diversity of an interaction partner's friendship network and the goals that they adopt signal identity threat or identity safety to their partner. The research examines the mediating mechanisms for how these cues influence affective, cognitive, and behavioral outcomes of both the racial majority and minority individual in the interaction. The research investigates two potential influences on the experiences of social identity threat among whites and ethnic minorities during interracial interaction: 1) the racial diversity (or homogeneity) of an interaction partner's friendships, and 2) the goals (learning or performance) that the partner adopts for the interaction context. The research tests whether this friendship cue and the goals adopted by one's partner influence ethnic minority and white individuals' interaction experiences. In particular, this research measures levels of social identity threat, affect, behavior during the interactions, cognitive depletion, and satisfaction resulting from the interracial interactions. Furthermore, this research tests whether shifts in people's goals within the interaction context can reduce identity threat, opening the door for positive interracial contact in the future-even in the absence of a diverse friendship network. Taking a relational view of interracial interactions, the research examines the processes by which friendships and goals influence experiences of identity threat and its affective, cognitive, and behavioral outcomes from the perspectives of both majority and minority group members.Broader Impacts. The research makes novel theoretical contributions to the existing literature on interracial interactions and social identity threat, as well as provides practical guidance about how interracial interactions might be structured to reduce identity threat and facilitate smooth exchange and more enjoyment for both minority and majority group members in the future. This NSF Research Starter Grant allows the PI to continue and extend her postdoctoral work on the effects of situational cues and identity contingencies in the context of interracial interactions. This work contributes to identity threat theory and provides a better understanding of the processes by which cues affect the dynamics of interracial interactions. The PI will serve as a role model and mentor to students interested in examining these important societal issues from a rigorous, scientific perspective. Currently, the PI works with a racially diverse team of graduate and undergraduate students in her lab at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and this funding aids the PI in obtaining the necessary resources, including graduate student support, to begin an independent research program on this topic.