Documenting the Routine Burden of Devalued Difference in the Professional Workplace

Abstract

Professional workplaces that embody an “ideal worker” image that is implicitly white and male set-up persistent biases against the competence and suitability for authority of those who are not white men, forcing them to work harder to prove their competence and fit in. The added labor of coping with these burdens is largely invisible to dominant actors in the workplace who do not experience them. To facilitate change by making such burdens visible for all, we present data from a survey of 1,349 architects, including white, Asian, Black, Latinx, and mixed race/other underrepresented men and women, about their specific behavioral experiences of prove-it-again (competence) bias, tightrope (authority) bias, problems of fit, exclusion, emotion work, and interruptions. Across all measures, white men architects report significantly lower levels of these burdens than do women of any race and almost all non-white men. Consistent with status expectations and stereotype prototypicality theories, we find intersectional patterns in the relative burdens experienced by women and men of different racial groups. Gender differences in bias experiences are greatest among white, less among Asian, and least among Black architects. Women of color report the highest levels of bias overall.

Re-Conceptualizing Kaepernick’s Kneeling Protests and His Banishment From the NFL as an Infringement on His “Right to Work”

“…As we will demonstrate, Colin Kaepernick's case, as well as the cases of the other Black athletes whose experiences we document here, are examples of two stereotype proclivity biases (Williams & Dempsey, 2014), or as Ridgeway et al (2022) describe it, two types of "problems of fit": prove-itagain bias and tight rope bias. Ridgeway et al (2022) theorize two forms of work-place bias that apply to our analysis of the case of Colin Kaepernick: prove it again bias and tightrope bias. Prove it again bias refers to the colloquial concept that people with marginalized identities, especially Black people and women, have to be "twice as good" to attain professional success.…”

“…The present study expands on previous research by shifting the focus of interrogation from the protest itself to the response by the NFL to the protests. We situate the case of Colin Kaepernick in the labor force literature, specifically the literature on the ideal worker as an illustration of status expectations states theory and prototypicality theory as defined by Ridgeway et al (2022). As our research will demonstrate, Kaepernick was denied the right to work not just because he was protesting, but because (1) he was protesting the racial conditions in the United States (Bonilla-Silva, 2021), and (2) he was invoking/highlighting his "Blackness," for example by choosing to wear an afro hair-style reminiscent of the Black power movement of the 1960s and 1970s and worn by prominent actors in that movement, including Angela Y. Davis.…”

“…For people with marginalized identities, this burden can be experienced as "walking a tightrope." Those who refuse to conform experience discrimination that Ridgeway et al (2022) term "tight-ripe bias." For example, in many workplaces, Black people are required to conform to specific hair styles (Greene, 2011;Wingfield, 2008).…”

“…We argue that "locking" Kaepernick out from working in the NFL violates his right to pursue his "common purpose" and engage his specific skills in the labor market. We situate the case of Colin Kaepernick in the theoretical frames of status expectations states theory and prototypicality theory (Ridgeway et al, 2022) in order to analyze and interrogate the NFL's response to Kaepernick's protest by denying him the right to work. We compare the experiences of Colin Kaepernick to those of other Black athletes who, like Kaepernick, challenged social norms around race, demanded racial equality, and were subsequently, as Kaepernick was, denied the right to make a living in their chosen fields.…”

Gender Differences in Job Resources and Strains in Authority Positions

“…Ridgeway and colleagues have argued that the status element of gender stereotypes is particularly relevant for explaining barriers to women achieving positions of authority and power in the workplace (Ridgeway 2001(Ridgeway , 2014Ridgeway and Correll 2004;Ridgeway, Korn, and Williams 2022). Status beliefs are widely held cultural beliefs about the social significance and general competence of individuals viewed as categorically distinct on the basis of gender and other categorizations such as race and class (Berger, Cohen, and Zelditch 1972).…”