Stereotyping and Identity
Stereotyping is the central theme, and the factor that is central to Steele's entire hypothesis. The book deals with the ways in which people respond to each other based on their own perception of stereotypical identity. Steele includes decades of studies about different identities, predominantly gender, race, sexual orientation, age and social class. One of the main conclusions in his research is that people judge each other based on preconceived stereotypes about their identity. Every identity has a stereotype; the dumb blonde, the lazy fat person, the mentally degenerating senior. Stereotyping is also shown to be a very common form of bigotry employed by people whom one would not generally consider bigoted. An engineering professor might assume a woman will not do as well in his class as a male student, or that a student with a working-class background might not have the same intellectual capacity as a student with a middle class background. These assumptions are all based on stereotypes.
However, the most important area of this theme is that the fear of proving a stereotype is actually more powerful than being victim of a stereotype. Women perform badly on tests that are specifically stated to be tests of gender ability. Black students perform badly on tests that are specifically stated to be tests of racial ability. Yet when the same students took the same tests with no stated purpose, they performed just as well as their counterparts.
The Achievement Gap
Steele was first inspired to write and research this book by his tenure as a professor at the University of Michigan, where he noticed an achievement gap between black and white students, and male and female students. A large percentage of this gap was caused not by the students themselves but by the professors grading their papers; it was automatically assumed that these students would perform true to stereotype, and professors graded them by the traditional stereotype as well. The most frightening example of this stereotypical prejudice was Larry Summers, President of Harvard University, who for some time entertained the idea that women are genetically inferior to men when it comes to math and the sciences.
Another explanation postulated by Steele is that female, and black, students, have been in some way ground down by experiencing prejudice, and therefore become their stereotype. They are no longer motivated to work as hard because they feel that their hard work will not be rewarded.
