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theses

Despite the rise of interracial dating and marriage in the United States, little to no research has considered the role that exposure to interracial couples may have on people’s beliefs about race. The present experimental study examined whether exposure to Black/White interracial couples, as compared to same-race couples, influences White men and women’s conceptions of race (i.e. racial essentialism, Black/White intergroup attitudes and perceived similarity), and whether the perceived racial essentialism of the couple could, in part, explain shifts in beliefs about race. Heterosexual, White men and women (N = 324) who were exposed to couples with varying racial compositions did not show changes in their own racial attitudes. However, the White members of Black/White interracial couples were perceived as lower in racial essentialism than members of same- race couples. Lower perceived racial essentialism in turn served a mediating role between exposure to couples and participants’ self-reported race-related attitudes. This work suggests that members of interracial couples are perceived as having less essentialist views of race than same-race couples, but more work is still needed to better understand how these perceived attitudinal differences may influence the attitudes of White perceivers exposed to interracial couples.

ETD_10517

M.S.

Includes bibliographical references

doi:10.7282/t3-3f77-4d25

ETD graduate

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