Scholars view racial identity as a fluid social construction that can shift with time and context. But outside of academia, do people intuitively see racial identity as fluid or fixed? Four studies reveal that people see racial identity as varying flexibly with the social context—in particular, assimilating to the race of one’s friends. Participants perceived the same Black–White Biracial men as identifying as more Black (Study 1) and wanting to be perceived as more stereotypically Black (i.e., athletic; Study 3c) when with Black friends than when alone. Conversely, Biracial men were perceived as identifying as more White (Study 2) and wanting to be perceived as more stereotypically White (i.e., competent and well-spoken; Studies 3a, 3b) when with White friends. Fluid inferences of racial identity also extended to Monoracial people (Studies 4a, 4b). We conclude that people perceive others’ racial identity as shifting with the social context—eliciting distinct biases.

People prefer to form relationships with people like themselves—a tendency that extends even to facial appearance, resulting in groups whose members look alike. Here, we investigated the mechanisms underlying homophilic resemblance using facial photos of fraternity/sorority members from two time points: before joining the group and after belonging to the group for three years. Analyses of both subjective trait impressions and objective face-shape measurements revealed that not only did group members look alike, they resembled one another even before joining the group. Moreover, photos of potential fraternity recruits revealed that facial appearance predicted both the group that individuals sought to join and the group’s likelihood of accepting them. Individuals, therefore, seek to join groups consisting of people who look like them, and the groups preferentially accept new members who resemble those already in the group. This bidirectional preference for homophily likely perpetuates intragroup homogeneity, suggesting potential implications beyond appearance.

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