Abstract
The last few years have been a testament to the fact that anti-Black racism is alive and well in America. It manifests not only in macro-level indicators of social inequity (e.g., housing, education) but also manifests within individual organizations. Importantly, individuals in organizations can endorse anti-Black attitudes and other racist sentiments that influence others’ expressions of bias. In the current research, we examine the power of proximal organizational norms in two studies. In Study 1, 269 participants heard a member of their organization condone or condemn anti-Black attitudes and were then asked to give their own attitudes about Black Americans. Results revealed that participants were strongly influenced by the organization member’s stance on anti-Black racism; compared to those in the control condition, those who heard an organizational peer condone anti-Black attitudes were also more likely to condone, and those who heard an organizational peer condemn these attitudes were also more likely to condemn. In Study 2, we continued to examine the impact of norms on expressions of anti-Black bias by investigating the relationship between bias expression and both proximal (within an organization) and distal (within a more socially and physically distant reference group, i.e., country) norms. Consistent with Study 1, results from 183 participants showed that the proximal norms (but not the distal norms) were strongly related to the expression of anti-Black bias. We discuss the results by considering the critical role that both individual workplace allies and collective organizations can play in shaping the expression of anti-Black bias.
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Data Availability
The data sets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are not publicly available but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
Notes
Although we are not aware of research examining whether people are more influenced in interactions with someone of the same gender than in those with someone of a different gender, an abundance of research has consistently shown that, compared to men, women are (a) less influential and (b) more easily influenced (see Carli, 2001; Eagly, 1983).
In terms of their job roles, 35% of participants were in middle management (n = 64), 12% were in junior management (n = 22), 12% were support staff (n = 22), 12% were other trained professionals (n = 21), 11% were administrative staff (n = 20), 7% were skilled laborers (n = 13), 4% were in upper management (n = 7), 2% were consultants (n = 4), and 2% were researchers (n = 3), 1% were partners (n = 2), 1% were temporary workers (n = 2), and the remaining 2% held another role (n = 3).
Although we did not predict any interaction between Proximal and Distal norms, we included the interaction term in our analyses for completeness.
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Mikki Hebl, Anamely Salgado, and Abby Corrington developed the study conception and design. Material preparation and data collection were performed by Anamely Salgado, Mikki Hebl, and Abby Corrington. Data analyses were performed by Abby Corrington, Naomi Fa-Kaji, and Mikki Hebl. The manuscript was written by Abby Corrington, Naomi Fa-Kaji, Mikki Hebl, Anamely Salgado, Derek Brown, and Linnea Ng, and all authors provided critical revisions to the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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The questionnaire and methodology for this study were approved by the Institutional Review Board of Rice University (IRB approval numbers: IRB-FY2016-856 and IRB-FY2016-568).
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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
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Appendix A
Appendix A
Condition: Condone Discrimination toward Black Individuals
A new study recently conducted by the Pew Research Center reveals the attitudes that 253,000 American employees have about Black issues in the workplace. It is important to note that this study polled an equal number of individuals affiliated as Democrat and Republican. The results revealed the following. NOTE: We are going to be asking you to remember these percentages on the next page, so please take a moment to note the results of the survey.
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78% of employees believe that people spend way too much time talking about Black Lives Matter in the workplace.
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75% of employees believe that Blacks are often promoted because of their race rather than their qualifications.
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71% of employees believe that employees should be able to tell jokes about race so long as they are not targeted to a specific individual.
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71% of employees are against enacting more laws to prevent workplace discrimination against Blacks.
Condition: Condemn Discrimination toward Black Individuals
A new study recently conducted by the Pew Research Center reveals the attitudes that 253,000 American employees have about Black issues in the workplace. It is important to note that this study polled an equal number of individuals affiliated as Democrat and Republican. The results revealed the following.
NOTE: We are going to be asking you to remember these percentages on the next page, so please take a moment to note the results of the survey.
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78% of employees believe that people should spend much more time talking about Black Lives Matter in the workplace.
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75% of employees believe that Blacks are promoted because of their qualifications and not because of their race.
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71% of employees believe that employees should not be able to tell jokes about race even if they are not targeted to a specific individual.
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71% of employees are in favor of enacting more laws to prevent workplace discrimination against Blacks.
Condition: Control
A study by the Pew Research Center is being conducted to examine the attitudes that some 253,000 American employees have about Black issues in the workplace. It is important to note that this study polled an equal number of individuals affiliated as Democrat and Republican. The study will look at the following:
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how people feel about employees talking about Black Lives Matter in the workplace
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the extent to which people may believe people are promoted because of their race versus qualifications
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whether employees should be able to tell jokes about race in the workplace
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whether employees believe more laws should be to prevent workplace discrimination against Blacks.
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Corrington, A., Fa-Kaji, N.M., Hebl, M. et al. The Influence of Social Norms on the Expression of Anti-Black Bias. J Bus Psychol 38, 89–108 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10869-022-09822-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10869-022-09822-2