Perceptions of punitiveness in education
Abstract
Previous research has shown that black students are disproportionately disciplined in schools and the method of discipline varies by race. Black students, especially black males, are often punished with a more criminal approach than their white peers. One factor in this inequality is how black students are perceived as being more purposeful in their disruptive actions and are punished more harshly. This research aimed to examine whether a name would activate race or gender stereotypes and would affect how participants evaluated fairness of a hypothetical student's treatment in a college academic setting. There were four conditions which used names to signify race and gender categories: white female (Emily), black female (Ebony), white male (Dustin), and black male (DeShawn). This study examined differences between these four conditions to see whether perceptions of fair treatment varied based on the perceived race or gender. The most statistically significant results were found when examining perceived differences in the truthfulness of the hypothetical student. White males were found to be the most truthful, followed by black females, black males, and then white females were found to be the least truthful. There were other interesting findings in punitiveness, predicting future behavior, influence over other students, and fairness. However these finding were only moderately significant. Future research should examine these relationships and obtain a larger sample to see if the relationships found in this study hold true.