Copyright �� The British Psychological Society Reproduction in any form (including the internet) is prohibited without prior permission from the Society Clearing the air: The effect of experimenter race on target���s test performance and subjective experience David M. Marx1* and Phillip Atiba Goff2 1 Department of Social and Organizational Psychology, University of Groningen, The Netherlands 2 Department of Psychology, The Pennsylvania State University, USA According to stereotype threat theory (Steele, 1997), stereotyped targets under- perform on challenging tests, in part because they are worried about being viewed in terms of the negative stereotype that they are intellectually inferior. How then are the negative effects of stereotype threat reduced for stereotyped targets? To examine this issue, a study was conducted to investigate whether stereotype threat���s adverse effects are reduced when a Black experimenter administers a verbal test to Black participants. We further examined the question of whether Black participants have a subjective awareness of stereotype threat. Results showed that when a Black experimenter gave a verbal test to Black participants, they did not suffer the typical performance decrements associated with stereotype threat. Additionally, results supported the hypothesis that Black participants have conscious access to the experience of stereotype threat and that this effect is partially mediated by their endorsement of the stereotype. Defining the borders and mechanisms of stereotype threat (Steele, 1997 Steele, Spencer, & Aronson, 2002) has become an increasingly important task. At its core, stereotype threat theory seeks to explain, from the target���s perspective, why certain groups perform worse than their motivations and prior performances suggest they should. Particularly for women in mathematics, and Black students in most academic domains, this underperformance on important standardized tests, such as the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT), can place them at a disadvantage in their pursuit of higher education. In the case of Black students, there are many factors that may contribute to the relative dearth of these students attending 4-year colleges. Economic hardships, inferior extracurricular opportunities, and substandard schooling at the pre-college level are just some examples of the structural barriers that many Black students must overcome to reach their academic goals. Beyond these obvious structural inequalities, * Correspondence should be addressed to David Marx, Department of Social and Organizational Psychology, University of Groningen, Grote Kruisstraat 2/1, 9712 TS Groningen, The Netherlands (e-mail: d.marx@ppsw.rug.nl). The British Psychological Society 645 British Journal of Social Psychology (2005), 44, 645���657 q 2005 The British Psychological Society www.bpsjournals.co.uk DOI:10.1348/014466604X17948

Copyright �� The British Psychological Society Reproduction in any form (including the internet) is prohibited without prior permission from the Society the standardized test gap is still one of the most prominent explanations for minority underrepresentation in college. Moreover, for decades this ���testing gap��� has been the source of intergroup tension, political debate, and the target of countless government and local intervention programmes (Bowen & Bok, 1998 Lemann, 1999 Ramist, Lewis, & McCamley-Kenkins, 1994). Consequently, it is seen as one of the most acute problems currently facing the American education system. Stereotype threat theory offers a unique perspective on this problem, suggesting that the traditional explanations for the testing gap (e.g. structural inequality, or more insidious explanations) may be insufficient (cf. Lemann, 1999). According to Steele (1997) there is a general ���threat in the air��� whenever a negatively stereotyped group member enters a situation where negative stereotypes might apply. In evaluative situations, such as taking standardized tests, this threat can lead to underperformance for stereotyped targets, due to their concern about confirming a negative stereotype about their group (Steele, 1997 Steele & Aronson, 1995). Despite stereotype threat theory���s tremendous contributions to our understanding of the testing gap, there are at least two crucial elements of the theory that remain under- explored. The first is how one diminishes stereotype threat in high-stakes testing situations. Standard stereotype threat studies have reduced or eliminated the performance decrement, either by making the test non-diagnostic of ability (Steele & Aronson, 1995), stating that the test does not show gender differences (Spencer, Steele, & Quinn, 1999), or by changing the meaning of the test in other ways, (e.g. from a test of athletic intelligence to one of athletic ability Stone, Lynch, Sjomeling, & Darley, 1999). While changing the social meaning of a test seems, definitionally, to be the only way to reduce stereotype threat, the problem of changing the social meaning of a diagnostic test is one to which we have found few empirical solutions (cf. Inzlicht & Ben-Zeev, 2000 Marx & Roman, 2002 Marx, Stapel, & Muller, 2005 McIntyre, Paulson, & Lord, 2002). The second is the subjective experience of situations that induce stereotype threat. In other words, are participants aware of this ambient threat and their stereotype-related concerns or is the entire experience processed beneath awareness? There is relatively little empirical evidence from which to draw an accurate picture of participants��� experiences of stereotype threat (Davies, Spencer, Quinn, & Gerhardstein, 2002 Maass & Cadinu, 2003 Schmader & Johns, 2003 Steele et al., 2002 Wheeler & Petty, 2001). In this article, we address both questions because we believe that finding answers to these questions will greatly enhance our understanding of how stereotype threat affects the academic performance and subjective experience of stereotyped targets. The experience of stereotype threat In much of the literature, stereotype threat is defined and understood generally as the ���threatening experience��� of knowing that one may be evaluated in accordance with the negative stereotypes held about one���s group (Marx, Brown, & Steele, 1999 Steele, 1997 Steele et al., 2002). Indeed, this situation can be triggered in a variety of ways (e.g. test diagnosticity Steele & Aronson, 1995), but what all stereotype threat manipulations have in common is the fact that they make a stereotype about inferior intellectual ability relevant only for targets��� test performance. Hence, if stereotype threat occurs because it leads to heightened accessibility of a negative stereotype, then the salience of group memberships associated with that stereotype should be greater in those settings where David M. Marx and Phillip Atiba Goff 646