When Societal Norms and Social Identity Collide: The Race Talk Dilemma for Racial Minority Children
Open accessAbstract
Racial minorities face a unique “race talk” dilemma in contemporary American society: Their racial background is often integral to their identity and how others perceive them, yet talk of race is taboo. This dilemma highlights the conflict between two fundamental social processes: social identity development and social norm adherence. To examine how, and with what costs, this dilemma is resolved, 9- to 12-year-old Latino, Asian, Black, and White children ( N = 108) completed a photo identification task in which acknowledging racial difference is beneficial to performance. Results indicate minority children are just as likely to avoid race as White children, and such avoidance exacted a cost to performance and nonverbal comfort. Results suggest that teachers are particularly important social referents for instilling norms regarding race. Norms that equate color blindness with socially appropriate behavior appear more broadly influential than previously thought, stifling talk of race even among those for whom it may be most meaningful.
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Racially colorblind perspectives are dominant among many white adolescents.
“Because racially colorblind perspectives are dominant among many white adolescents (Pauker et al., 2015)”
From Studying Ethnic-Racial Identity among White Youth: White Supremacy as a Developmental Context (2022) · cites this paper as Pauker et al., 2015
The Discussion says White children adhered to societal colorblind norms, supporting the general point about colorblindness. But the Method > Participants section identifies the sample as 9–12-year-old elementary-school children, including 27 White children—not White adolescents. The paper also describes adherence to norms, rather than establishing that colorblind perspectives are personally held by many White adolescents. (LLM, conf=0.87)
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Sorted by citations
Bias Awareness Predicts Color Conscious Racial Socialization Methods among White Parents
Perry, S. P., Skinner, A. L., & Abaied, J. L. (2019) · Journal of Social Issues · doi:10.1111/josi.12348 · Cited by 110 · see citing works
Studying Ethnic-Racial Identity among White Youth: White Supremacy as a Developmental Context
Moffitt, U., & Rogers, L. O. (2022) · Journal of Research on Adolescence · doi:10.1111/jora.12762 · Cited by 81 · see citing works
“Because racially colorblind perspectives are dominant among many white adolescents (Pauker et al., 2015), racial identity development can seem stagnant among this population.”
Background
- Authors
- Pauker, K., Apfelbaum, E. P., & Spitzer, B.
- Affiliations
- University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa (US)
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (US)
- New York University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Pauker, Kristin
- Venue
- Social Psychological and Personality Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2015-08-07
- Volume
- 6
- Issue
- 8
- Pages
- 887-895
- ISSN
- 1948-5506 (ISSN-L)
- 1948-5514
- PMC
- PMC4629255
- OpenAlex
- W2100680499
- Cited by
- 58
- References
- 5
- Citations by year
- 2026: 4 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 2 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 10 · 2021: 10 · 2020: 4 · 2019: 6 · 2018: 3 · 2017: 6 · 2016: 2
- FWCI
- 12.16
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Social Psychological and Personality Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (K99HD065741)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Racial and Ethnic Identity Research
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Critical Race Theory in Education
- Keywords
- race talk, racial identity, social norms, color vision deficiency, racial minorities, children, photo-identification, performance cost, social identity development, Latino children, Asian children, Black children
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