Date of Award
Spring 5-9-2023
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department/Program
Forensic Psychology
Language
English
First Advisor or Mentor
Daryl A. Wout
Second Reader
Gabriel Camacho
Third Advisor
Demis Glasford
Abstract
In recent years, there has been a drastic increase in anti-Asian hate crimes in the United States, as well as news stories highlighting African Americans as perpetrators of anti-Asian hate crimes. As such, the paper focuses on how Asian Americans expect to be perceived by others, and how those expectations may change depending on the race (African American or White) and gender (male or female) of the conversation partner. A survey was created, which employed deception to have participants believe that they would have a short video conversation with somebody else about a political topic, and which randomly assigned each participant a partner who was an African American man, African American woman, a White woman, or a White man. Each participant was given a profile of their conversation partner, with each profile being identical except for the profile’s race and gender. The initial hypothesis was that participants would be more comfortable with women than men and that they would expect to be viewed more positively when speaking with an African American person compared to a White person. After conducting a survey with 238 Asian American people, results indicated that regardless of gender, Asian Americans were more likely to think that an African American profile would view them more warmly than a White profile. Participants also believed themselves less equipped to handle conversational challenges with a White profile than with an African American profile, and they would feel more comfortable approaching the African American profiles than the White profiles. Given that participants self-reported experiencing more discrimination from White people than African American people, this difference could be attributed to personal experiences of discrimination.
Recommended Citation
Schlegel, Ariana, "Metaperceptions of Interactions Between Asian and African American Adults" (2023). CUNY Academic Works.
https://academicworks.cuny.edu/jj_etds/270