MRPG: Solo Status and Self-Construals

标准化考试成绩和平均绩点表明，平均而言，少数民族学生的表现不如白色学生。虽然社会经济地位和教育质量等因素经常被认为是这种差异的解释，但社会心理学的实验室研究表明，在社会环境中高度独特的人往往表现出较弱的记忆力和解决问题的能力。因此，少数民族大学生的表现可能会受到阻碍，因为在大多数大学环境中，他们经历了很高的社会独特性。这项研究计划补助金将调查种族独特性对少数群体而非多数群体成员的学业成绩产生负面影响的过程。有人提出，作为环境中唯一的种族成员（一种被称为“孤独状态”的体验）可能会改变一个人对自我的感知（即，一个人的“自我”。这对非洲裔美国人和白人来说是不同的。据预测，当一个非裔美国人是唯一的黑人在测试的情况下，是黑人成为一个人的自我安慰的更大的一部分，和人觉得更代表和更负责的成员，他们的种族群体。另一方面，白人预计不会采用这种基于群体的自我安慰。一个白色人可能会以个人主义的方式看待自我，而不会觉得自己是其他白人的代表或负责人。两个实验将在实验室环境中进行，使用适当的比较组，以测试1）单独状态是否会导致非洲裔美国人比白人更基于群体的自我协调; 2）单独状态的非洲裔美国人是否因为代表他们的种族的额外压力而表现得比对照组更差; 3）与对照组相比，处于孤独状态的非裔美国人是否会避免高挑战性的任务，以避免成为他们种族的不良代表。这项研究将帮助我们理解为什么白人和黑人在学校表现不同，即使他们可能有可比的教育准备。这项研究将有助于设计方案，以阻止少数民族在课堂上的孤独地位的负面影响，并将在商业环境中的工作表现以及影响。

Standardized test scores and grade point averages indicate that, on average, racial minority students do not perform as well as White students. Although factors such as socioeconomic status and quality of education are often suggested as explanations for this difference, laboratory research in social psychology suggests that individuals who are highly distinctive in their social environments tend to show weaker memory and problem solving skills. Thus, minority college students may be hindered in their performance because in most college environments they experience high social distinctiveness. This research planning grant will investigate the process by which racial distinctiveness negatively affects academic performance among minority, but not majority, group members. It is proposed that being the only member of one's race present in the environment (an experience termed "solo status") may change one's perception of the self (i.e., one's "self-construal"). This is expected to happen differently for African-Americans and Whites. It is predicted that when an African-American is the only Black person in a testing situation, being Black becomes a greater part of that person's self-construal, and the person feels more representative of and more accountable to members of their racial group. Whites, on the other hand, are not predicted to adopt this group-based self-construal. A White person may perceive the self in individualistic terms, and not feel representative of or accountable to other Whites as solos. Two experiments will be conducted in a laboratory setting, using appropriate comparison groups, to test 1) whether solo status induces a more group-based self-construal for African-Americans than for Whites; 2) whether African-Americans in solo status perform more poorly than a control group because of the added pressure of representing their race; and 3) whether African-Americans in solo status avoid highly challenging tasks compared to a control group, to avoid the potential of being a poor representative of their race. This research will help us understand why Whites and Blacks perform differently in school even though they may have comparable educational preparation. This research will be useful in designing programs to stop the negative effects of solo status for racial minorities in the classroom, and will have implications for job performance in business settings as well.