Would that it were so simple: Dimensions of context diversity differentially relate to four implicit interethnic associations

ABSTRACT

Published studies point to heterogeneity in the relations between context diversity and implicit associations. To rule out methodological variations as an explanation, the relations between three dimensions of context diversity and four implicit associations were examined across 747 counties and 341 metropolitan areas, keeping constant as many factors as possible. Black people were evaluated more positively and were less associated with weapons in contexts with higher variety or higher integration combined with lower minority representation. Asian and Native Americans were more strongly associated with the American identity in contexts with higher minority representation and higher variety. These effects were largely consistent across context type, were seldom moderated by participant ethnicity, and held when controlling context-level education, median income, economic inequalities, proportion of U.S. citizens, and population density. The specificity of context diversity to implicit association relations is not attributable to methodological variations. Possible mechanisms underlying these effects are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Implicit
• intergroup
• diversity
• ethnicity
• context

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest to disclose.

Data availability statement

The data described in this article are openly available in the Open Science Framework at https://osf.io/jwgtb/.

Open scholarship

This article has earned the Center for Open Science badges for Open Data, Open Materials and Preregistered. The data and materials are openly accessible at https://osf.io/jwgtb/ and https://osf.io/y9hiq/ and https://osf.io/egyux.

  

     

Notes

1. We deviated from the preregistered analysis plan in three ways. First, models with White representation, variety, and integration were not conducted due to multicollinearity of White representation with other predictors (R²_county = .743, R²_MSA = .725). Second, three-level models with state as Level 3 had insufficient statistical power due to the low number of Level 2 units; the median number of counties per state was 8 and the median number of MSAs per state was 2. Not including state resulted in dropping two additional context variables (former confederate state and democratic vote percentage in the 2012 presidential election). Third, we used a more stringent alpha level (p < .005 rather than p < .05) to determine significance (Benjamin et al., 2018).

2. Simple slopes were always tested at one standard deviation above and below the mean.

3. For the decomposition of cross-level interactions, we focused on the simple effects of the context diversity indicators for White vs. minority participants because this perspective is more aligned with our research questions. Although not without interest, interpretations of the effects of participant ethnicity at different levels (low, high) of context diversity are not straightforward.

4. A negative r² value is possible with the method employed to calculate effect size (Snijders & Bosker, 2012). The value is reported for completeness although the simple effects should be interpreted cautiously given convergence issues.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Melody Sadler

Melody Sadler is an Associate Professor in Psychology at San Diego State University. Dr. Sadler received her Ph.D. in Social Psychology from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Her research interests include implicit social cognition and intergroup relations. The primary courses that she teaches are introductory, intermediate and advanced statistics.

Angela Somo

Angela Somo earned her Master’s degree in Psychology at San Diego State University. Her research has focused on implicit intergroup associations.

Thierry Devos

Thierry Devos is Professor in the Department of Psychology at San Diego State University. He earned a Ph.D. in social sciences from the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, and completed post-doctoral training at the University of California – Santa Barbara and at Yale University. His research interests are primarily in the area of intergroup relations. The goal of his current work is to understand how implicit intergroup biases are embedded in social and cultural contexts. He is teaching courses on cultural psychology, prejudice and stereotyping, and the psychology of diversity and multiculturalism.