Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

Efforts to promote women in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) require a clearer understanding of the experience of social identity threat outside academic contexts. Although social identity threat has been widely studied among students, very little research has examined how the phenomenon occurs naturalistically among working professionals in ways that could undermine productivity and well-being. The present research employed daily diary methodology to examine conversations with colleagues as triggers of social identity threat among a sample of 44 male and 52 female working engineers. Results of multilevel modeling revealed that (1) women (but not men) reported greater daily experiences of social identity threat on days when their conversations with male (but not female) colleagues cued feelings of incompetence and a lack of acceptance, and (2) these daily fluctuations of social identity threat predicted daily levels of mental exhaustion and psychological burnout. The implications for social identity threat in working professionals are discussed.

Keywords

social identity threat subtle bias gender diversity women in STEM

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Bauer

D. J.

Preacher

K. J.

Gil

K. M.

(2006). Conceptualizing and testing random indirect effects and moderated mediation in multilevel models: New procedures and recommendations. Psychological Methods, 11, 142–163.

Cohen

G. L.

Garcia

(2005). I am us: Negative stereotypes as collective threats. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 89, 566–582. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.89.4.566

Demerouti

Bakker

Nachreiner

Schaufeli

(2001). The job demands-resources model of burnout. The Journal of Applied Psychology, 86, 499–512.

Hall

W. M.

Schmader

(2014). Research conversations among physics graduate students. (Unpublished manuscript). University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

Hill

Corbett

St. Rose

(2013). Why so few?: Women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Washington, DC: AAUW.

Holleran

S. E.

Whitehead

Schmader

Mehl

M. R.

(2011). Talking shop and shooting the breeze: A study of workplace conversation and job disengagement among STEM faculty. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 2, 65–71.

Hunt

(2010). Why do women leave science and engineering? (NBER Working paper 15853). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.

Inzlicht

Tullett

A. M.

Legault

Kang

S. K.

(2011). Lingering effects: Stereotype threat hurts more than you think. Social Issues and Policy Review, 5, 227–256.

Kalokerinos

E. K.

Von Hippel

Zacher

(2014). Is stereotype threat a useful construct for organizational psychology research and practice? Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice, 7, 381–402.

10.

Logel

Walton

G. M.

Spencer

S. J.

Iserman

E. C.

Von Hippel

Bell

A. E.

(2009). Interacting with sexist men triggers social identity threat among female engineers. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 96, 1089–1103.

11.

Maslach

Schaufeli

W. B.

Leiter

M. P.

(2001). Job burnout. Annual Review of Psychology, 52, 397–422. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.52.1.397

12.

PayScale. (2013). Majors that pay you back. Retrieved from http://www.payscale.com/

13.

Pinel

E. C.

(1999). Stigma consciousness: The psychological legacy of social stereotypes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 76, 114–128. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.76.1.114

14.

Richeson

J. A.

Shelton

(2012). Stereotype threat in interracial interactions. In Inzlicht

Schmader

(Eds.), Stereotype threat: Theory, process, and application (pp. 231–245). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

15.

Sackett

P. R.

Ryan

(2012). Concerns about generalizing stereotype threat research findings to operational high-stakes testing. In Inzlicht

Schmader

(Eds.), Stereotype threat: Theory, process, and application (pp. 249–263). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

16.

Schmader

Johns

Forbes

(2008). An integrated process model of stereotype threat effects on performance. Psychological Review, 115, 336–356.

17.

Shapiro

Neuberg

(2007). From stereotype threat to stereotype threats: Implications of a multi-threat framework for causes, moderators, mediators, consequences, and interventions. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 11, 107–130.

18.

Steele

C. M.

(1999, August). Thin ice: Stereotype threat and black college students. The Atlantic Monthly, pp. 28, 44–47, 50–54.

19.

Steele

Aronson

(1995). Stereotype threat and the intellectual test performance of African Americans. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69, 797–811.

20.

Steele

Spencer

Aronson

(2002). Contending with group image: The psychology of stereotype and social identity threat. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 34, 379–440.

21.

Von Hippel

Issa

Stokes

(2011). Stereotype threat: Antecedents and consequences for working women. European Journal of Social Psychology, 41, 151–161.

22.

Walton

G. M.

Spencer

S. J.

(2009). Latent ability grades and test scores systematically underestimate the intellectual ability of negatively stereotyped students. Psychological Science, 20(9), 1132–1139.

23.

Wheeler

Nezlek

(1977). Sex differences in social participation. Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 35, 742–754.

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.

0.08 MB

0.00 MB

Engineering Exchanges

Abstract

Keywords

Get full access to this article

References

Supplementary Material