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Now online at Perspectives @PsychScience: The misperception of racial economic #inequality. This one was written with @ivuoma, @natdaum, @jruck_psych, and @jaricheson: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1745691619863049 … 1/xpic.twitter.com/PDFdjiRSHQ
In this paper, we took aim at the American #mythofracialprogress. In essence, folks in the US have a tendency to believe "that our national disgrace of racial oppression has been overcome, albeit through struggle, and that racial equality has largely already been achieved." 2/xpic.twitter.com/eVUBLVZSfl
For evidence, we martialed a 1,000 person national survey of the US. We asked participants to estimate the wealth of the typical Black family if the typical White family had $100. We asked this at 12 time points in random order. 3/xpic.twitter.com/ujvE36IC7j
We found that respondents perceive linear progress toward greater Black-White equality that is not consistent with government statistics on wealth. 4/xpic.twitter.com/5iNakAG4Rc
Folks thought that society was becoming more equal over time, misperceiving Black-White wealth #inequality in the direction of greater equality: 97% of respondents were inaccurate on average and more than 60% were inaccurate by at least 50 points (toward greater equality). 5/x
These inaccurate perceptions of racial equality extend to families at all all income quintiles and at all education levels. Respondents similarly overestimated Latinx-White and Asian-White wealth equality, though the latter was a smaller overestimate (also smaller gap). 6/xpic.twitter.com/qSfumkmsuD
Importantly, folks thought that Black and White families would be treated most equally at the highest levels of education, where the best and brightest reside. In reality, the gap between perceived equality and actual racial #inequality was for the most educated families. 7/xpic.twitter.com/Oa4H0HESjT
With such a large gap (D > 1.00) between perceived and actual racial economic inequality, this pattern of misperceptions is likely caused by a number of structural and psychological forces that warrant future investigation. 8/xpic.twitter.com/kfnbGly23O
Race and Just World Beliefs were consistent predictors. NonWhite respondents were more accurate whereas people who believed society is just tended to overestimate the most. 9/x
Financial literacy also predicted accuracy. Perhaps understanding wealth means knowing some of the pieces (transmission across generations) necessary to understand how chattel slavery and Jim Crow can combine with current practices to stifle the wealth of Black families. 10/x
One thought from this work is something like, "what if we just tell people about the actual wealth gap? Won't that change people's minds?" We unsure of this approach because people can and do fill in information about racial disparities with their own racism. 11/x
What to do next is a topic of our current research. One thing we feel strongly about is that colorblind approaches to #inequality have the potential to do serious damage to Americans in the most need because these approaches obscure where reparative action is essential. 12/xpic.twitter.com/B8CA4G9aSi
Critically, though perceptions of racial inequality are partly psychological, these gaps are about policy. A concerted effort across the social sciences is necessary to ground perceptions in reality and propose policies that restore the promise outlined by our Constitution. 13/x
Also @ivouma and @natdaum are on the #academicjobmarket this year and @jruck_psych is looking for a postdoc-- their brilliant fingerprints are all over this work (both this paper and in their own independent research). 14/x
We will conclude this thread (for now) with our appeal to center race in the science of #inequality. FAQs follow later today! 15/x https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1745691619863049 …pic.twitter.com/MzGsN0VgDG
The FAQ in case you miss it above:https://twitter.com/mwkraus/status/1171810897096007682 …
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