Whistling Vivaldi: And Other Clues to How Stereotypes Affect Us (Issues of Our Time) - Hardcover

Steele, Claude M.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 039306249X ISBN 13: 9780393062496

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, 2010

Synopsis

Acclaimed social psychologist Claude Steele offers an insider’s look at his groundbreaking findings on stereotypes and identity.

Through dramatic personal stories, Claude Steele shares the experiments and studies that show, again and again, that exposing subjects to stereotypes―merely reminding a group of female math majors about to take a math test, for example, that women are considered naturally inferior to men at math―impairs their performance in the area affected by the stereotype. Steele’s conclusions shed new light on a host of American social phenomena, from the racial and gender gaps in standardized test scores to the belief in the superior athletic prowess of black men. Steele explicates the dilemmas that arise in every American’s life around issues of identity, from the white student whose grades drop steadily in his African American Studies class to the female engineering students deciding whether or not to attend predominantly male professional conferences. Whistling Vivaldi offers insight into how we form our senses of identity and ultimately lays out a plan for mitigating the negative effects of “stereotype threat” and reshaping American identities.

About this title

About the Author

Claude M. Steele is an American social psychologist and the Lucie Stern Professor in the Social Sciences, Emeritus, at Stanford University. The author of Whistling Vivaldi, he is a member the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society. He lives in California.

Edition details

• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Publication date: 2010
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 039306249X
• ISBN 13: 9780393062496
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 258