Claiming the validity of negative in-group stereotypes when foreseeing a challenge : a self-handicapping account
This research proposes a self-handicapping process in which people proactively endorse negative in-group stereotypes when there is the prospect of failure in a task. In Experiment 1, we found that women were more likely to endorse the math-gender stereotype stigmatizing their gender group when they...
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| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2013
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10356/97742 http://hdl.handle.net/10220/12131 |
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| Institution: | Nanyang Technological University |
| Language: | English |
| Summary: | This research proposes a self-handicapping process in which people proactively endorse negative in-group stereotypes when there is the prospect of failure in a task. In Experiment 1, we found that women were more likely to endorse the math-gender stereotype stigmatizing their gender group when they anticipated a difficult versus easy math task. In Experiment 2, the same pattern was observed among men stigmatized with relatively poor verbal skills. In Experiment 3, we found that such a self-handicapping tendency was most prominent among individuals with high trait self-esteem, who are presumably more motivated to maintain self-esteem versus those with low trait self-esteem. All together, these results suggest that endorsing negative in-group stereotypes can be used as an anticipatory coping mechanism, occurring even before receiving failure feedback in the presence of a high risk of failure. |
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