What Do Physicists From Majority Groups Know and Believe about Race and Gender?

这个项目将通过对大多数人对白人妇女和有色人种边缘化的信念、知识和态度的深入理解，解决增加物理学多样性的重大需求。美国的大多数物理学家都是白人男性，这是许多因素的结果，包括不必要的障碍，这些障碍不公平地阻碍了白人女性和有色人种的成功。增加物理学的多样性既提高了物理学研究的质量，也是一个公正的问题。这个项目的重大意义在于，它不同于以前的工作(通常关注的是那些来自代表性不足的少数群体的人)，它关注的是白人男性，他们在物理学家中占了过多的比例。通过对120名白人男性物理学学生和教授的采访，这个项目将描述大多数群体对物理学中基于种族和性别的边缘化的理解。这些信息将对设计有效地让少数群体和多数群体参与努力使物理学多样化的项目非常重要。该项目的三个目标是：(1)记录和了解大多数人对物理学中基于种族和性别的不平等的知识、信念和经验；(2)发展关于大多数人对种族、性别和物理学中的边缘化的理解所依据的逻辑的理论；以及(3)使用这些理论来确定变革的途径。为了实现这些目标，五所研究型大学的120名自认为是白人男性的物理学学生和教职员工将就物理学中的种族和性别问题进行采访。访谈数据将使用一个框架进行分析，该框架从四个方面描述边缘化：意识形态、制度、人际关系和内在化。通过填补多数群体对种族和性别的看法方面的知识空白，该项目将促进对少数群体在物理学领域面临的成功障碍的理解。

This project will address the significant need to increase diversity in physics by developing a robust understanding of the majority population's beliefs, knowledge, and attitudes toward the marginalization of white women and people of color. Most physicists in the United States are white men, which is a result of many factors, including unnecessary barriers that unfairly impede the success of white women and people of color. Increasing diversity in physics both improves the quality of physics research and is a matter of justice. This project is significant in its departure from previous work (which has generally focused on those from underrepresented minority groups) by focusing on white men, who constitute an overrepresented majority of physicists. Through interviews with 120 white male physics students and professors, this project will describe the majority group's understanding of race- and gender-based marginalization in physics. This information will be important for designing programs that productively involve both minority and majority populations in efforts to diversify physics. The three goals of the project are to (1) document and understand the majority population's knowledge of, beliefs about, and experience with race- and gender-based inequities in physics; (2) develop theories about the logic that underlies the majority population's understanding of race, gender, and marginalization in physics; and (3) use these theories to identify avenues for change. To achieve these goals, 120 self-identified white male physics students and faculty at five research universities will be interviewed about race and gender in physics. Interview data will be analyzed using a framework that describes marginalization along four dimensions: ideological, institutional, interpersonal, and internalized. By filling the gap in knowledge about the majority group's views about race and gender, this project will advance the understanding of barriers to success faced by people from minority groups in physics.