Could stereotypes have an effect on learning?
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 2010 16:29 PM

A new study from social psychologist Robert J. Rydell has found that negative stereotypes of certain groups of people may have a negative impact on how they learn and process information.

The research, which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), was created to examine how individuals in a stereotype try to expel the preconceived notion, which could ultimately affect their knowledge.

Rydell examined a test group of women that involved Chinese characters and color judgment tasks. Women who were reminded of the negative stereotypes for their gender, such as their math and visual processing abilities, ended up not learning the same skills as the women in the control group who were not reminded of the female stereotype.

Researchers noted that a multitude of studies were done in the past that measured test performance and stereotypes, but little is known about how a preconceived notion affects learning as a whole.

"[The present study] points to the importance of creating environments that reduce the impact of stereotype threat during mathematical skill acquisition by women," the authors concluded. "If creating such an environment is not done, the learning deficits that result could well be cumulative, causing problems that continually worsen as development proceeds."