Doctoral Dissertation Research: Social Capacities and Personal Vulnerabilities in Encountering Implicit Bias

人们自然关心别人对他们的看法，这不仅是因为他们渴望社会接触，也是因为这种看法对获得资源和获得机会至关重要。对于被边缘化的人群来说尤其如此，他们往往必须证明他们应该得到某些福利、服务或地位。该项目探讨了边缘化人口在他们极其脆弱的情况下利用的不同战略，以改善他们获得资源的机会。除了有助于对研究生进行实证、科学数据收集和分析方法的培训外，该项目还将对寻求庇护者和其他移民缓解社会经济转型和公民参与的组织产生重大影响，潜在地提高接待方案的有效性，并促进为特定人口量身定做服务。本论文项目将研究两个不同的寻求庇护者群体通过在不同情况下既脆弱又有能力地展示自己在不同情况下既脆弱又有能力来证明他们值得获得庇护的迭代过程。这两个群体的策略是否不同，他们倾向于发挥他们感知到的优势还是试图弥补他们感知到的劣势？他们的战略是如何随着时间的推移而变化和发展的，以应对各种经验和互动？组织专业人员对每个人的工作方式是否不同，根据每个寻求庇护者的背景提供具体的建议和指导？在当前面临越来越多的庇护申请以及社会经济挑战的背景下，该项目比较了来自不同原籍国的两个寻求庇护者群体的战略和经历：一个具有高度的文化相似性，包括语言流利，但感觉到的脆弱性较低；另一个，文化相似程度较低，但感觉到的脆弱性很高。这种比较分析了不同群体在追求共同目标的过程中，宏观条件对微观层面自我呈现策略的不同影响。研究人员将利用多种人种学方法，包括参与者观察、探索性访谈和对寻求庇护者和组织工作人员的半结构化访谈。这些数据将被分析，以确定两组人的行为模式是否随着时间的推移而不同，这些模式是如何随着特定经历的发展而发展的，以及寻求庇护者如何看待自己与另一组人的关系。这个项目准备为有关移民、人道主义和官僚主义的人类学知识做出贡献，同时也产生关于战略性自我呈现的更广泛的社会科学见解，特别是与内隐偏见相关的。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

People are naturally concerned with how they are perceived by others not only because they desire social contact but also because such perceptions are important for gaining resources and access to opportunities. This is especially true for marginalized populations, which often must demonstrate that they are deserving of certain benefits, services, or statuses. This project explores the different strategies that marginalized populations leverage in contexts where they are acutely vulnerable, to improve their access to resources. In addition to contributing to the training of a graduate student in the methods of empirical, scientific data collection and analysis, this project will have significant implications for organizations that seek to ease the socioeconomic transition and civic participation of asylum seekers and other migrants, potentially improving the effectiveness of reception programs and facilitating tailoring of services for particular populations. This dissertation project will examine the iterative processes by which two different groups of asylum seekers participating in a reception program at the same organization demonstrate that they are deserving of asylum by presenting themselves as both vulnerable and capable in various situations. Do the two populations strategize differently, and do they tend to play to their perceived strengths or attempt to compensate for their perceived weaknesses? How do their strategies change and develop over time in response to various experiences and interactions? Do organizational professionals work with each population differently, providing specific advice and guidance depending on each asylum seeker’s background? Situated in a context that is currently experiencing increasing numbers of asylum applications, alongside socioeconomic challenges, this project compares the strategies and experiences of two asylum seeker populations from different countries of origin: one, with a high level of cultural similarity, including language fluency, but low perceived vulnerability; the other, with a low level of cultural similarity but high perceived vulnerability. This comparison offers the opportunity to parse through the differential effects of macro-level conditions on micro-level self-presentation strategies of different groups of people as they pursue common goals. The researcher will utilize multiple ethnographic methods, including participant observation, exploratory interviews, and semi-structured interviews with asylum seekers and organizational workers. These data will be analyzed to determine whether or not the two groups’ patterns of behavior diverge over time, how these patterns develop in response to particular experiences, and how asylum seekers perceive themselves in relation to the other group. This project is poised to contribute to anthropological knowledge concerning migration, humanitarianism, and bureaucracy, while also producing broader social scientific insights about strategic self-presentation, especially as related to implicit bias.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.