Investigating Preservice Teachers' Competence to Notice Ethnic Microaggressions in the Classroom

Abstract

Ethnic microaggressions convey insensitivity or demean a person's ethnic identity and have been documented in educational settings targeting minoritized students. Drawing on the racial noticing framework and insights from teacher psychological characteristics, the present study examined preservice teachers' competence to attend and interpret ethnic microaggressions and explored the attitudinal dispositions (i.e., implicit and explicit prejudice, critical reflection, and empathy) that contribute to teachers' awareness of these discriminatory actions. Using a vignette design across two experimental studies in Germany (Study 1, N = 147, Mage = 23.7; 88% females; Study 2, N = 184, Mage = 23.2; 64.7% females), our results indicated that participants demonstrated noticing ability in detecting microaggressions targeting Turkish heritage students. We found less consistent evidence for the role of participants' attitudinal dispositions as predictors of racial noticing. In Study 1, implicit prejudice was negatively related to attending microaggressions, while, surprisingly, explicit prejudice was positively associated with interpreting microaggressions. However, these findings did not replicate in Study 2. Additionally, higher levels of critical reflection were positively linked to a greater ability in attending and interpreting ethnic microaggressions. We discuss implications for teacher education on noticing ethnic microaggressions in schools.