Nothing in Their Heads | Psychology Today

Nothing in Their Heads | Psychology Today: "The stereotype priming of behavior effect has been widely replicated already and is also consistent with other established findings in psychology and neuroscience. As for the stereotype priming effect itself, there should be no doubt by this point. It is well established in a variety of research domains.  Stereotype priming effects are the cause of the well-established "stereotype threat" effect (see, for example, Notes 5 & 6) in which activating a person's racial or ethnic or gender group identity has deleterious effects on that person's subsequent academic or athletic performance. Stereotype threat effects have been documented, disturbingly, even in 5 year old children; when Nalini Ambady and colleagues (Note 7) primed preschool girls (in a Harvard day care center) with their female identity they do worse on math tests than they would if that identity (which contains the stereotypic belief that "girls can't do math") was not primed. Priming effects on behavior, as in the elderly-priming study, have now been demonstrated in infants as young as 18 months old (Note 8)."

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