The present study investigated whether Black and White Americans differed on the dimensions of Holland’s RIASEC model of vocational interests. Theoretical explanations of why racial differences in interests may occur are advanced drawing on Gottfredson’s (1981) theory of circumscription and compromise, and social identity theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1986). A meta-analysis of 54 studies was conducted that included 926,462 participants and 306 effect sizes. Our results showed that, on average, Black Americans have stronger Social, Enterprising, and Conventional interests than White Americans; and White Americans have stronger Realistic and Investigative interests than Black Americans (no differences found on Artistic interests). Further, moderator analyses revealed that: (a) the Black-White gaps in Realistic, Investigative, Social, Enterprising, and Conventional interests all increase with education (in particular, with the onset of college), (b) the gaps in Social, Enterprising, and Conventional interests favoring Black Americans increase with age, and the gap in Realistic interests favoring White Americans decreases with age (although age and education effects tend to be confounded), (c) race gaps in Realistic and Social interests are larger in male samples, and (d) race gaps in Social, Enterprising, and Conventional interests may have decreased (but not disappeared) in more recent birth cohorts. We discuss these findings highlighting the roles of access to opportunity and of social identity in potentially giving rise to racial differences in interests. This research helps us discern factors that may contribute to diversity recruiting and the building of diverse talent pipelines in various careers.

本研究调查了美国黑人和白人在荷兰职业兴趣 RIASEC 模型的维度上是否存在差异。为何会出现种族利益差异的理论解释是借鉴 Gottfredson (1981) 的限制和妥协理论以及社会认同理论 (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) 的先进理论。对 54 项研究进行了荟萃分析，其中包括 926,462 名参与者和 306 个效应量。我们的结果表明，平均而言，美国黑人比美国白人具有更强的社会、企业和传统利益；与美国黑人相比，美国白人对现实和调查的兴趣更强（在艺术兴趣上没有发现差异）。此外，主持人分析显示：(a) 现实、调查、社会、进取、和传统利益都随着教育而增加（特别是随着大学的开始），（b）有利于美国黑人的社会、进取和传统利益的差距随着年龄的增长而增加，有利于美国白人的现实利益的差距随着年龄的增长而缩小（尽管年龄和教育的影响往往是混杂的），（c）男性样本中现实和社会兴趣的种族差距更大，（d）社会、企业和传统兴趣的种族差距可能已经减少（但没有消失）在最近的出生队列中。我们讨论了这些发现，强调了获得机会和社会认同在可能引起种族利益差异方面的作用。