Week 2 Readings: Stereotypes
Angela C. Stanley
Week 2 Readings/Video: Denaturalizing Adolescence: The
Politics of Contemporary Representations, Adults Think Black Girls are Older
Than They Are – And It Matters, and Child Development Core Story, Part 2: Serve
and Return (video)
Stereotypes were previously defined as misconceptions
about a specific group, until more recent research claims that stereotypes should
simply be defined as any belief about a group, regardless on the level of
accuracy (Jussim, Crawford, & Rubenstein, 2015). When it comes to children, youth, and
adolescence, stereotypes are very visible in society today. Some of the most common stereotypes include being
hormonally driven, highly peer oriented, and identity seeking.
Being hormonally driven refers to the bodily changes
that occur during puberty and its effects on behavior. Often, when considering this stereotype,
adults view adolescents as unstable and not capable of real responsibilities or
challenging curriculum. Therefore,
adopting this belief as fact creates an educational environment that does not
foster personal or academic development.
But the negative effects do not stop with school; this belief of adolescence
being hormonally driven also has deeper negative effects across race and gender. For example, common stereotypes of young
black girls and black women are that they are hypersexualized or more aggressive compared to their white counterparts,
therefore changing the way society sees and treats them.
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| How do you think the child ended up on the ground in each picture? Did she: a) fall off the swing b) get pushed off the swing |
Being highly peer oriented refers to an adolescent’s need
for social environments and acceptance above anything else. This belief can find its greatly flawed and
bias roots in the comparison of adolescence to the autonomy of middle-class
White males. This means that if an
adolescent, regardless of gender, race, or socioeconomic status, does not present
as much autonomous behaviors as a typical White middle-class male, they are
considered not mature enough to act separately from their peers. Additionally, this stereotype that youth need
to be around peers creates less importance of parent-child interactions, or any
healthy adult-child interactions for that matter, and results in an increase of
developmental deficiencies that society asks schools to fix.
Lastly, being identity seeking refers to the idea that
adolescence is a transitional stage of life that you need to just “get through”
in order to emerge into a proper adult. This
stereotype disregards the need for proper interactions and teachings during the
first four critical stages of life and refers to adolescence as a “dark stage”
of life in which youth and teens are considered unable to represent themselves
so they need to be taught who they are by removing any innate personal identity
they have and replacing it with the school systems’ version of what someone of
their age bracket should be like.
Having stereotypical beliefs is fully unconscious and uncontrollable,
but what we do with these thoughts can make all the difference. During my undergrad career, I spent two years
studying the immediacy of positive racial stereotypes and how it affects our
judgments. (See "Visual Attention to Faces When Making Rapid Judgments" by Angela C. Viphakone in the RIC library :] I'm super proud of it haha.) This experience helped me
reflect on my own life as an Asian-American and the stereotypes that I
encountered throughout my life. As I try
to reflect on being stereotyped for my age, the main feelings that surface are
my discomfort in the workplace or during job interviews. Often at work, I hear the term “millennial”
and surprise older individuals when they hear I have many contrary views
compared to others my age. During job
interviews, I have been told by hiring managers that they are looking for someone
“with more experience,” even though I have almost 6 years of experience in
behavior modification, a BA in psychology, a minor in behavioral neuroscience,
and I am a certified Health and Wellness Coach from the American Council on
Exercise. Yet, I still need more
experience to work this entry level position.
Go figure.
References
Jussim, L., Crawford, J., & Rubenstein, R.
(2015). Stereotype (In)Accuracy in
Perceptions of Groups
and Individuals. Current
Directions in Psychological Science, 24(6), 490-497,
This is real... It happens to me too, without thinking...So now before I find myself filling in the gaps about a person, I will stop and ask myself; is this true???? or am I assuming it based on experiences from other people, media persuasive strategies or culture???
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteAngela,
When I first started my undergraduate journey, I will never forget one of my classmates coming up to me and asking me what High School I attended. I did not see the harm in answering the question and so I said Central High School. Then his next question blew me away and not in a good way. He then asked me how old my child was. I asked him what he was talking about and his response was, “ Almost all the girls at Central High School wind up pregnant before they graduate”. Keep in mind, I did not know this person from Adam and he automatically assumed I had a child based on where I went to high school. I dropped that class the next day. My mother was involved in a somewhat similar situation like the 15 year old girl who was arrested by the police. She was on her way home from the grocery store in a taxi when the cab was ordered to pull over by the sirens. The driver thought he was going to be reprimanded by the police based on the car, but the police officer stopped walking when he got to the back door. He looked inside at my mom for a minute and said, I’m sorry, you look like someone we are looking for. He just escaped from prison.
Angela,
ReplyDeleteI think you chose a very powerful image of the two kids by the swing. Due to stereotypes in our society I can see what picture would be assumed. Like in our readings young black females are often seen as aggressive and in a she said she said situation I feel the stereotype would assume that the little girl of color is at fault. I think it's important to understand these stereotypes in order to take a step back and reanalyze the situation.
Thank you for this thoughtful response Angela. I also appreciate how you call out "autonomy" as a characteristic of white males and an unrealistic ideal. In some ways the whole notion of autonomy and individualism (Western, capitalist, culturally constructed) is itself problematic. White wealthy western men have traditionally only been able to be so autonomous because of the invisible labor being performed by wives and mothers, people of color, and immigrants behind the scenes.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I would love to know more about your study on positive racial stereotypes!