Across six studies, we demonstrate that exposure to biracial individuals significantly reduces endorsement of colorblindness as a racial ideology among White individuals. Real-world exposure to biracial individuals predicts lower levels of colorblindness compared with White and Black exposure (Study 1). Brief manipulated exposure to images of biracial faces reduces colorblindness compared with exposure to White faces, Black faces, a set of diverse monoracial faces, or abstract images (Studies 2-5). In addition, these effects occur only when a biracial label is paired with the face rather than resulting from the novelty of the mixed-race faces themselves (Study 4). Finally, we show that the shift in White participants’ colorblindness attitudes is driven by social tuning, based on participants’ expectations that biracial individuals are lower in colorblindness than monoracial individuals (Studies 5-6). These studies suggest that the multiracial population’s increasing size and visibility has the potential to positively shift racial attitudes.
AllportG. W. (1954). The nature of prejudice. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
2.
ApfelbaumE. P.NortonM. I.SommersS. R. (2012). Racial colorblindness: Emergence, practice, and implications. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 21, 205-209. doi:10.1177/0963721411434980
3.
ApfelbaumE. P.PaukerK.AmbadyN.SommersS. R.NortonM. I. (2008). Learning (not) to talk about race: When older children underperform in social categorization. Developmental Psychology, 44, 1513-1518. doi:10.1037/a0012835
4.
ApfelbaumE. P.PaukerK.SommersS. R.AmbadyN. (2010). In blind pursuit of racial equality?Psychological Science, 21, 1587-1592. doi:10.1177/0956797610384741
5.
ApfelbaumE. P.SommersS. R.NortonM. I. (2008). Seeing race and seeming racist? Evaluating strategic colorblindness in social interaction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95, 918-932. doi:10.1037/a0011990
6.
BabbittL. G.ToosiN. R.SommersS. R. (2015). A broad and insidious appeal: Unpacking the reasons for endorsing racial colorblindness. In NevilleH. A.GallardoM. E.SueD. W. (Eds.), What does it mean to be color-blind? Manifestation, dynamics and impact (pp. 53-68). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
7.
BarghJ. A.ChartrandT. L. (2005). The mind in the middle: A practical guide to priming and automaticity research. In ReisH. T.JuddC. M. (Eds.), Handbook of research methods in social and personality psychology (pp. 253-285). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
8.
BlanchardF. A.LillyT.VaughnL. A. (1991). Reducing the expression of racial prejudice. Psychological Science, 2, 101-105. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9280.1991.tb00108.x
9.
BlascovichJ.WyerN. A.SwartL. A.KiblerJ. L. (1997). Racism and racial categorization. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 72, 1364-1372. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.72.6.1364
10.
BrewerM. B.MillerN. E. (1984). Beyond the contact hypothesis: Theoretical perspectives in desegregation. In MillerN. E.BrewerM. B. (Eds.), Groups in conflict: The psychology of desegregation (pp. 123-146). New York, NY: Academic Press.
11.
BuhrmesterM. D.KwangT.GoslingS. D. (2011). Amazon’s Mechanical Turk: A new source of inexpensive, yet high-quality, data?Perspectives on Psychological Science, 6, 3-5. doi:10.1177/1745691610393980
12.
ChenJ. M.HamiltonD. L. (2012). Natural ambiguities: Racial categorization of multiracial individuals. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 48, 152-164. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2011.10.005
13.
ChenJ. M.NormanJ. B. (2016). Toward a comprehensive understanding of the factors underlying multiracial person perception. Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy, 16, 417-420. doi:10.1111/asap.12122
14.
CialdiniR. B. (2003). Crafting normative messages to protect the environment. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 12, 105-109. doi:10.1111/1467-8721.01242
15.
ColumbC.PlantE. A. (2016). The Obama effect six years later: The effect of exposure to Obama on implicit anti-Black evaluative bias and implicit racial stereotyping. Social Cognition, 34, 523-543. doi:10.1521/soco.2016.34.6.523
16.
CorrellJ.ParkB.SmithJ. A. (2008). Colorblind and multicultural prejudice reduction strategies in high-conflict situations. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 11, 471-491. doi:10.1177/1368430208095401
17.
CrosbyJ. R.MoninB.RichardsonD. (2008). Where do we look during potentially offensive behavior?Psychological Science, 19, 226-228. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02072.x
18.
DarleyJ. M.GrossP. H. (1983). A hypothesis-confirming bias in labeling effects. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 44, 20-33. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.44.1.20
19.
DasguptaN.GreenwaldA. G. (2001). On the malleability of automatic attitudes: Combating automatic prejudice with images of admired and disliked individuals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 81, 800-814. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.81.5.800
20.
DuncanJ. C.Jr. (2000). The American “legal” dilemma: Colorblind I/Colorblind II—The rules have changed again: A semantic apothegmatic permutation. Virginia Journal of Social Policy & the Law, 7, 315-354.
21.
DunhamY.OlsonK. R. (2016). Beyond discrete categories: Studying multiracial, intersex, and transgender children will strengthen basic developmental science. Journal of Cognition and Development, 17, 642-665. doi:10.1080/15248372.2016.1195388
22.
FaulF.ErdfelderE.BuchnerA.LangA.-G. (2009). Statistical power analyses using G*Power 3.1: Tests for correlation and regression analyses. Behavior Research Methods, 41, 1149-1160. doi:10.3758/BRM.41.4.1149
23.
FiskeS. T. (1998). Stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination. In GilbertD. T.FiskeS. T.LindzeyG. (Eds.), The handbook of social psychology (Vol. 4, pp. 357-411). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
24.
FreemanJ. B.PaukerK.ApfelbaumE. P.AmbadyN. (2010). Continuous dynamics in the real-time perception of race. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 46, 179-185. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2009.10.002
25.
FreemanJ. B.PennerA. M.SapersteinA.ScheutzM.AmbadyN. (2011). Looking the part: Social status cues shape race perception. PLoS ONE, 6(9), Article e25107.
26.
FreyF. E.TroppL. R. (2006). Being seen as individuals versus as group members: Extending research on metaperception to intergroup contexts. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 10, 265-280. doi:10.1207/s15327957pspr1003_5
27.
GaitherS. E. (2015). “Mixed” results: Multiracial research and identity explorations. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 24, 114-119. doi:10.1177/0963721414558115
28.
GaitherS. E.BabbittL. G.SommersS. R. (2018). Resolving racial ambiguity in social interactions. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 76, 259-269. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2018.03.003
29.
GaitherS. E.SommersS. R. (2013). Living with an other-race roommate shapes Whites’ behavior in subsequent diverse settings. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 49, 272-276. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2012.10.020
30.
GaitherS. E.SommersS. R.AmbadyN. (2013). When the half affects the whole: Priming identity for biracial individuals in social interactions. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 49, 368-371. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2012.12.012
31.
GaskinsP. (1999). What are you? Voices of mixed-race young people. New York, NY: Henry Holt and Company.
32.
GelmanS. A. (2003). The essential child: Origins of essentialism in everyday thought. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
33.
GoffP. A.JacksonM. C.NicholsA. H.Di LeoneB. A. (2013). Anything but race: Avoiding racial discourse to avoid hurting you or me. Psychology, 4, 335-339. doi:10.4236/psych.2013.43A048
34.
HoloienD. S.SheltonN. S. (2012). You deplete me: The cognitive costs of colorblindness on ethnic minorities. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 48, 562-565. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2011.09.010
35.
HughesJ. M.BiglerR. S.LevyS. R. (2007). Consequences of learning about historical racism among European American and African American children. Child Development, 78, 1689-1705. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2007.01096.x
36.
HurtadoS. (2005). The next generation of diversity and intergroup relations research. Journal of Social Issues, 61, 595-610. doi:10.1111/j.1540-4560.2005.00422.x
37.
ItoT. A.UrlandG. R. (2003). Race and gender on the brain: Electrocortical measures of attention to the race and gender of multiply categorizable individuals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85, 616-626. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.85.4.616
LeeJ.BeanF. D. (2004). America’s changing color lines: Immigration, race/ethnicity, and multiracial identification. Annual Review of Sociology, 30, 221-242. doi:10.1146/annurev.soc.30.012703.110519
40.
LevyS. R.StroessnerS. J.DweckC. S. (1998). Stereotype formation and endorsement: The role of implicit theories. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 1421-1436. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.74.6.1421
41.
LoweryB. S.HardinC. D.SinclairS. (2001). Social influence effects on automatic racial prejudice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 81, 842-855. doi:10.1037//0022-3514.81.5.842
42.
LunJ.SinclairS.WhitchurchE. R.GlennC. (2007). (Why) do I think what you think? Epistemic social tuning and implicit prejudice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 93, 957-972. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.93.6.957
43.
MacraeC. N.BodenhausenG. V. (2000). Social cognition: Thinking categorically about others. Annual Review of Psychology, 51, 93-120. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.51.1.93
44.
MaddoxK. B.GrayS. (2002). Cognitive representations of Black Americans: Reexploring the role of skin tone. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 250-259. doi:10.1177/0146167202282010
45.
MarkusH. R.KitayamaS. (1991). Culture and the self: Implications for cognition, emotion, and motivation. Psychological Review, 98, 224-253.
46.
MarkusH. R.SteeleC. M.SteeleD. M. (2002). Color blindness as a barrier to inclusion: Assimilation and nonimmigrant minorities. In SchwederR.MinowM.MarkusH. R. (Eds.), Engaging cultural differences: The multicultural challenge in liberal democracies (pp. 453-472). New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation.
47.
NakashimaC. L. (1992). An invisible monster: The creation and denial of mixed-race people in America. In RootM. P. P. (Ed.), Racially mixed people in America (pp. 162-180). Newbury Park, CA: SAGE.
48.
NevilleH. A.LillyR. L.DuranG.LeeR. M.BrowneL. (2000). Construction and initial validation of the Color-Blind Racial Attitudes Scale (CoBRAS). Journal of Counseling Psychology, 47, 59-70. doi:10.1037/0022-0167.47.1.59
49.
NoS.HongY.LiaoH.LeeK.WoodD.ChaoM. M. (2008). Lay theory of race affects and moderates Asian Americans’ responses toward American culture. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95, 991-1004. doi:10.1037/a0012978
50.
NortonM. I.SommersS. R.ApfelbaumN. P.PuraN.ArielyD. (2006). Color blindness and interracial interaction: Playing the political correctness game. Psychological Science, 17, 949-953. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9280.2006.01810.x
51.
NortonM. I.SommersS. R.VandelloJ. A.DarleyJ. M. (2006). Mixed motives and racial bias: The impact of legitimate and illegitimate criteria on decision making. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 12, 36-55.
Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1, 551 U.S. 701 (2007).
54.
PaukerK.AmbadyN. (2009). Multiracial faces: How categorization affects memory at the boundaries of race. Journal of Social Issues, 65, 69-86. doi:10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.01588.x
55.
PaukerK.WeisbuchM.AmbadyN. (in preparation). I’m comfortable with racial ambiguity when it’s functionally important: Environmental constraints on processing racial ambiguity.
56.
PeeryD.BodenhausenG. V. (2008). Black + White = Black: Hypodescent in reflexive categorization of racially ambiguous faces. Psychological Science, 19, 973-977. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02185.x
57.
PettigrewT. F.TroppL. R. (2006). A meta-analytic test of intergroup contact theory. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 90, 751-783. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.90.5.751
58.
PettigrewT. F.TroppL. R. (2011). When groups meet: The dynamics of intergroup contact. New York, NY: Psychology Press.
PlautV. C. (2010). Diversity science: Why and how difference makes a difference. Psychological Inquiry, 21, 77-99. doi:10.1080/10478401003676501
61.
PlautV. C.ThomasK. M.GorenM. J. (2009). Is multiculturalism or color blindness better for minorities?Psychological Science, 20, 444-446. doi:10.111/j.1467-9280.2009.02318.x
62.
PollockM. (2004). Colormute: Race talk dilemmas in an American school. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
63.
Purdie-VaughnsV.DitlmannR. (2010). Reflection on diversity science in social psychology. Psychological Inquiry, 21, 153-159. doi:10.1080/1047840X.2010.486758
64.
RemediosJ. D.ChasteenA. L. (2013). Finally, someone who “gets” me! Multiracial people value others’ accuracy about their race. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, 19, 453-460. doi:10.1037/a0032249
65.
RichesonJ. A.NussbaumR. J. (2004). The impact of multiculturalism versus color-blindness on racial bias. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 40, 417-423. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2003.09.002
66.
RichesonJ. A.SommersS. R. (2016). Toward a social psychology of race and race relations for the twenty-first century. Annual Review of Psychology, 67, 439-463. doi:10.1146/annurev-psych-010213-115115
67.
RobbinsJ. M.KruegerJ. I. (2005). Social projection to ingroups and outgroups: A review and meta-analysis. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 9, 32-47. doi:10.1207/s15327957pspr0901_3
68.
RosenthalL.LevyS. R. (2012). The relation between polyculturalism and intergroup attitudes among racially and ethnically diverse adults. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, 18, 1-16. doi:10.1037/a0026490
69.
RothbartM.TaylorM. (1992). Category labels and social reality: Do we view social categories as natural kinds? In SeminG. R.FiedlerK. (Eds.), Language, interaction, and social cognition (pp. 11-36). London, England: SAGE.
70.
RyanC. S.CasasJ. F.ThompsonB. K. (2010). Interethnic ideology, intergroup perceptions, and cultural orientation. Journal of Social Issues, 66, 29-44.
71.
RyanC. S.HuntJ. S.WeibleJ. A.PetersonC. R.CasasJ. F. (2007). Multicultural and colorblind ideology, stereotypes, and ethnocentrism among Black and White Americans. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 10, 617-634. doi:10.1177/1368430207084105
72.
SaguyT.DovidioJ. F.PrattoF. (2008). Beyond contact: Intergroup contact in the context of power relations. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 34, 432-445. doi:10.1177/0146167207311200
73.
SanchezD. T.BonamC. B. (2009). To disclose or not to disclose biracial identity: The effect of biracial disclosure on perceiver evaluations and target responses. Journal of Social Issues, 65, 129-249. doi:10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.01591.x
74.
SanchezD. T.YoungD. M.PaukerK. (2015). Exposure to racial ambiguity influences lay theories of race. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 6, 382-390. doi:10.1177/1948550614562844
75.
SchofieldJ. W. (2007). The colorblind perspective in school: Causes and consequences. In BanksJ. A.McGeeC. A. (Eds.), Multicultural education: Issues and perspectives (4th ed., pp. 247-267). New York, NY: John Wiley.
76.
ShihM.BonamC.SanchezD. T.PeckC. (2007). The social construction of race: Biracial identity and vulnerability to stereotypes. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, 13, 125-133. doi:10.1037/1099-9809.13.2.125
77.
ShihM.SanchezD. T. (2005). Perspectives and research on the positive and negative implications of having multiple racial identities. Psychological Bulletin, 131, 569-591. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.131.4.569
78.
ShihM.SanchezD. T. (2009). When race becomes even more complex: Toward understanding the landscape of multiracial identity and experiences. Journal of Social Issues, 65, 1-11. doi:10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.01584.x
79.
SinclairS.HuntsingerJ.SkorinkoJ.HardinC. D. (2005). Social tuning of the self: Consequences for the self-evaluations of stereotype targets. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 89, 160-175. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.89.2.160
80.
SinclairS.LoweryB. S.HardinC. D.ColangeloA. (2005). Social tuning of automatic racial attitudes: The role of affiliative motivation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 89, 583-592. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.89.4.583
81.
SueD. W. (2004). Whiteness and ethnocentric monoculturalism: Making the “invisible” visible. American Psychologist, 59, 761-769.
82.
TajfelH.TurnerJ. C. (1979). An integrative theory of inter-group conflict. In AustinW. G.WorchelS. (Eds.), The social psychology of intergroup relations (pp. 33-47). Monterey, CA: Brooks-Cole.
83.
TatumB. D. (2003). “Why are all the Black kids sitting together in the cafeteria?” A psychologist explains the development of racial identity. New York, NY: Basic Books.
84.
TellesE. E.SueC. A. (2009). Race mixture: Boundary crossing in comparative perspective. Annual Review of Sociology, 35, 129-146.
Van LaarC.LevinS.SinclairS.SidaniusJ. (2005). The effect of university roommate contact on ethnic attitudes and behavior. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 41, 329-345. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2004.08.002
87.
VorauerJ. D.GagnonA.SasakiS. J. (2009). Salient intergroup ideology and intergroup interaction. Psychological Science, 20, 838-845. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9280.2009.02369.x
88.
WeisbuchM.SinclairS. A.SkorinkoJ. L.EcclestonC. P. (2009). Self-esteem depends on the beholder: Effects of a subtle social value cue. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 45, 143-148. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2008.07.021
89.
WilliamsT. K. (1996). Race as a process: Reassessing the “What are you?” encounters of biracial individuals. In RootM. P. P. (Ed.), The multiracial experience: Racial borders as the new frontier (pp. 191-210). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
90.
WolskoC.ParkB.JuddC. M.WittenbrinkB. (2000). Framing interethnic ideology: Effects of multicultural and color-blind perspectives on judgments of groups and individuals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78, 635-654. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.78.4.635
91.
YoungD. M.SanchezD. T.WiltonL. S. (2013). At the crossroads of race: Racial ambiguity and biracial identification influence psychological essentialist thinking. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, 19, 461-467. doi:10.1037/a0032565
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
