Perceived racial demographic shifts cause a conservative shift in White Americans through group-status threat.

Evidence

Abstract The U.S. Census Bureau projects that racial minority groups will make up a majority of the U.S. national population in 2042, effectively creating a so-called majority-minority nation. In four experiments, we explored how salience of such racial demographic shifts affects White Americans’ political-party leanings and expressed political ideology. Study 1 revealed that making California’s majority-minority shift salient led politically unaffiliated White Americans to lean more toward the Republican Party and express greater political conservatism. Studies 2, 3a, and 3b revealed that making the changing national racial demographics salient led White Americans (regardless of political affiliation) to endorse conservative policy positions more strongly. Moreover, the results implicate group-status threat as the mechanism underlying these effects. Taken together, this work suggests that the increasing diversity of the nation may engender a widening partisan divide. — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 8

Categorization

• XREF: Directly relevant to the reader’s threatened-privilege mobilization research program — this is a manipulable causal demonstration of the mechanism. — connects to: Perceived racial demographic shift may push White Americans toward conservatism. — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 1; Reminding White Americans of shifting racial demographics raises their group status threat. — Brenda Major and Alison Blodorn and Gregory Major Blascovich, The threat of increasing diversity: Why…, 36; Racial status threat may drive conservative shifts even among minorities — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 94 (+19 more)
• QUESTION: The mechanism is group-status threat for race; whether it generalizes to gender, religion, nativity is the open question the reader is pursuing.

Related

• Perceived racial demographic shift may push White Americans toward conservatism. (similarity 0.95)
• Exposure to information about racial demographic change raises Whites’ status threat and conservatism (similarity 0.94)
• Racial status threat may drive conservative shifts even among minorities (similarity 0.93)
• Perceived demographic shift causal threat to White status shifts policy conservatism (similarity 0.93)
• Reminding White Americans of shifting racial demographics raises their group status threat. (similarity 0.92)
• Demographic threat generalizes conservative shift to race-neutral policy (similarity 0.91)
• Perceived racial demographic shift raises White group status threat that drives Trump support. (similarity 0.90)
• Perceived threat to in-group status evokes greater political conservatism. (similarity 0.90)
• Removing anticipatory status threat eliminates the conservative reaction to demographic shift. (similarity 0.90)
• Status threat from diversity shifts whites rightward regardless of party affiliation. (similarity 0.89)
• Group-status threat is the proposed causal mediator of shift-induced conservatism. (similarity 0.89)
• Reassuring whites that status will persist can blunt the threat of demographic shift. (similarity 0.89)
• Merely priming demographic-shift projections shifts unaffiliated voters toward conservative parties. (similarity 0.87)
• Racial demographic shift threatens Whites only when they identify strongly with their ethnic group. (similarity 0.86)
• Shrinking numerical majority makes White identity salient and politically mobilizing (similarity 0.85)

Broader Connections

• Reminding White Americans of shifting racial demographics raises their group status threat. #corroborates (0.98) — Brenda Major and Alison Blodorn and Gregory Major Blascovich, The threat of increasing diversity, 36
• Perceived demographic shift causal threat to White status shifts policy conservatism #corroborates (0.97) — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 40
• Exposure to information about racial demographic change raises Whites’ status threat and conservatism #corroborates (0.96) — Brenda Major and Alison Blodorn and Gregory Major Blascovich, The threat of increasing diversity, 16
• Perceived racial demographic shift raises White group status threat that drives Trump support. #corroborates (0.95) — Brenda Major and Alison Blodorn and Gregory Major Blascovich, The threat of increasing diversity, 5
• Group-status threat is the proposed causal mediator of shift-induced conservatism. #expands (0.90) — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 22
• Racial-shift reminders shift highly identified Whites toward Trump and against Sanders via status threat. #exemplifies (0.88) — Brenda Major and Alison Blodorn and Gregory Major Blascovich, The threat of increasing diversity, 53
• Demographic shift reminders backfire among low-identification Whites, shrinking Trump support. #qualifies (0.85) — Brenda Major and Alison Blodorn and Gregory Major Blascovich, The threat of increasing diversity, 5
• Removing anticipatory status threat eliminates the conservative reaction to demographic shift. #complicates (0.85) — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 86
• Demographic threat generalizes conservative shift to race-neutral policy #expands (0.82) — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 90
• Racial status threat may drive conservative shifts even among minorities #expands (0.80) — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 94
• Perceived threat to in-group status evokes greater political conservatism. #expands (0.80) — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 12
• Racial demographic shift threatens Whites only when they identify strongly with their ethnic group. #qualifies (0.78) — Brenda Major and Alison Blodorn and Gregory Major Blascovich, The threat of increasing diversity, 58
• Subtle racial attitudes stem from structural inequality plus perceived group threat #expands (0.75) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 3437
• Racial attitudes reduce to a felt sense of group position #complicates (0.72)
• Conservative minority-veto impulses recur whenever demographic change threatens white political dominance #expands (0.70) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 646