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This systematic literature review appraises critically the mediating variables of stereotype threat. A bibliographic search was conducted across electronic databases between 1995 and 2015. The search identified 45 experiments from 38 articles and 17 unique proposed mediators that were categorized into affective/subjective (n = 6), cognitive (n = 7) and motivational mechanisms (n = 4). Empirical support was accrued for mediators such as anxiety, negative thinking, and mind-wandering, which are suggested to co-opt working memory resources under stereotype threat. Other research points to the assertion that stereotype threatened individuals may be motivated to disconfirm negative stereotypes, which can have a paradoxical effect of hampering performance. However, stereotype threat appears to affect diverse social groups in different ways, with no one mediator providing unequivocal empirical support. Underpinned by the multi-threat framework, the discussion postulates that different forms of stereotype threat may be mediated by distinct mechanisms.

Cognitive stereotypes with regard to gender are prevalent, especially with regard to spatial cognition. However, literature suggests that age, rather than gender has more impact on objective spatial performance. The aim of this study was to create a detailed picture of the extent and direction of stereotypes held in general population. Individual differences in terms of age and gender, as well as age group identification and gender identification were studied in relation to the stereotypes held. In addition, self-reported performance was also considered, to compare stereotype beliefs to beliefs concerning one’s own performance. An online questionnaire was filled out by a large and heterogeneous sample of Dutch participants (N = 980). Results indicate that gender stereotypes concerning spatial abilities are clearly prevalent and held most strongly by male and young individuals. Stereotype beliefs were very similar to the patterns found for self-reported performance for gender, even though this is not supported by findings concerning objective performance. Stereotypes concerning age were largely absent. These findings indicate that the presence of stereotype beliefs and the individual differences in how strong such beliefs are should be considered in educational and clinical settings where spatial performance is evaluated.

To our knowledge, no published research has developed an individual difference measure of health-related stereotype threat (HRST). We adapted existing measures of academic stereotype threat to the health domain on a sample of black college students ( N  = 280). The resulting health-related stereotype threat scale-24 (HRST-24) was assessed for internal consistency, construct and incremental validity, and whether it explains variance in self-reported delays among four preventive health behaviors—blood pressure and cholesterol assays, physical exams, and routine checkups. After adjusting for several control variables, the HRST-24’s (full scale α  = 0.96) perceived black health inferiority (18 items; α  = 0.96) and perceived physician racial bias (6 items; α  = 0.85) subscales explained unique variance in delays among two of the four behaviors including a blood cholesterol check ( p  < .01) and routine checkup—albeit at marginal levels ( p  = .063) in the case of the latter. Overall, these data provide preliminary evidence of construct and incremental validity for the HRST-24 among blacks. Recommendations for administering the scale are provided and future directions for HRST research are discussed.

Recent work suggests that most older adults who volunteer to take part in cognitive experiments are more motivated to do well than are undergraduate students. This empirical evidence is echoed by the impressions of cognitive aging researchers. We surveyed a large group ( N = 88) of researchers asking about their perceptions of younger and older adults’ motivation to take part in lab-based research. Not only were older adults seen as more motivated than younger adults, but researchers thought that the two groups participate for different reasons: younger adults to obtain course credit or monetary compensation, older adults to get a sense of their cognitive health, to further science, and out of curiosity. However, older adults’ greater motivation to do well on cognitive tasks may leave them vulnerable to stereotype threat, the phenomenon by which individuals underperform when they are put in a position to either confirm or deny a negative stereotype about their group. In this opinion piece, we argue that most cognitive experiments, not just those designed to measure stereotype threat, likely induce some form of performance-related anxiety in older adults. This anxiety likely leads to greater task-related interference, or thoughts about how one is doing on the task, resulting in poorer performance. We discuss some of the potential implications for our understanding of neurocognitive aging.

PurposeEntrepreneurship, which traditionally has been a male occupation, still attracts fewer women than men. Challenging gender stereotypes within entrepreneurship is one avenue to increase women's entrepreneurial intention and promote women entrepreneurship. This study adapts the “think manager – think male” leadership perspective to the entrepreneurship context and explores gender stereotype's implications for both entrepreneurial intention and motivation to become an entrepreneur.Design/methodology/approachA total of 902 Spanish non-entrepreneurs, both male and female, were randomly asked about the representation of successful entrepreneurs (no-gender-mention), successful men entrepreneurs or successful women entrepreneurs (reduced stereotype threat condition vs no-gender-mention or men entrepreneurs' conditions). Then, female participants' entrepreneurial intention, its antecedents (i.e. attitudes toward entrepreneurship, subjective norms and entrepreneurial self-efficacy) and necessity vs opportunity motivation were measured and compared to their male counterparts' scores in those three conditions.FindingsFemale participants reported higher entrepreneurial intention, self-efficacy and opportunity motivation when assigned to the successful women entrepreneurs' condition. Younger participants – compared to older ones – also exhibited higher entrepreneurial intention and opportunity motivation, more positive attitudes toward entrepreneurship and higher scores in subjective norms. Furthermore, findings suggest a woman entrepreneur seems to be less accessible (or more counter-stereotypical) to male participants than to female participants and, thus, the “think entrepreneur – think male” bias is more noticeable in male participants. Therefore, reducing negative stereotype threat for women in entrepreneurship may increase women's entrepreneurial career aspirations. This is of utmost importance to optimize training courses and mentoring programs to strengthen women's self-efficacy in their entrepreneurial skills and capabilities.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the literature about gender, entrepreneurial intention and motivation by adapting a leadership paradigm (“think manager – think male”) to entrepreneurship (“think entrepreneur – think male”). These findings shed new light on the antecedents of entrepreneurial intention and motivation and have implications for policy measures. Acknowledging that exposure to successful women entrepreneurs as role models potentially facilitates entrepreneurship among women, governments should provide tailor-made incentives and support for women entrepreneurs in the form of awareness raising, networking and in the mass media.

Very little is known about whether and how socioemotional factors influence age differences in associative memory. Here, we tested the hypothesis that reducing the threat induced by age-based stereotypes can reduce age differences in learning performance and strategy. Using an associative learning task, we replicated the classic finding of age differences under a high-threat condition: older adults had longer reaction times than younger adults and were much more reluctant to use memory retrieval. However, age differences were greatly diminished under a low-threat condition. These findings demonstrate that memory retrieval is an ability not entirely lost as individuals age because merely reducing stereotype threat helped restoring it. We conclude that socioemotional factors, such as stereotype threat, should be considered when evaluating younger and older adults’ memory performance.

Sex differences in specific cognitive abilities are well documented, but the biological, psychological, and sociocultural interactions that may underlie these differences are largely unknown. We examined within a biopsychosocial approach how gender stereotypes affect cognitive sex differences when adult participants were tested in mixed- or same-sex groups. A total of 136 participants (70 women) were allocated to either mixed- or same-sex groups and completed a battery of sex-sensitive cognitive tests (i.e., mental rotation, verbal fluency, perceptual speed) after gender stereotypes or gender-neutral stereotypes (control) were activated. To study the potential role of testosterone as a mediator for group sex composition and stereotype boost/threat effects, saliva samples were taken before the stereotype manipulation and after cognitive testing. The results showed the typical male and female advantages in mental rotation and verbal fluency, respectively. In general, men and women who were tested in mixed-sex groups and whose gender stereotypes had not been activated performed best. Moreover, a stereotype threat effect emerged in verbal fluency with reduced performance in gender stereotyped men but not women. Testosterone levels did not mediate the effects of group sex composition and stereotype threat nor did we find any relationship between testosterone and cognitive performance in men and women. Taken together, the findings suggest that an interaction of gender stereotyping and group sex composition affects the performance of men and women in sex-sensitive cognitive tasks. Mixed-sex settings can, in fact, increase cognitive performance as long as gender-stereotyping is prevented.

As stereotype threat was initially examined in experimental settings, the effects of such threats have often been tested by temporarily manipulating social identity threats. This study expands the literature by examining 9th-grade adolescents’ naturalistic stereotype threat, using data from the National Study of Learning Mindsets in the United States (n ~= 6040, age: 13–17, Mage = 14.31, 6.9% Black boys, 6.5% Black girls, 13.1% Latinos, 12.3% Latinas, 31.5% White boys, 29.7% White girls). The results indicate that Black and Latinx students experience higher levels of stereotype threat in high school mathematics classrooms than do their White peers. When students perceive that their teachers have created fixed mindset climates, they experience greater stereotype threat. Stereotype threat, in turn, negatively predicts Black and Latino boys and White girls’ later achievement via anxiety. These findings highlight the importance of creating mathematics classrooms that cultivate a growth mindset and minimize social identity threat.

In this article we discuss how social or group identities affect achievement. We also present a model of identity engagement that describes how a salient social identity can trigger psychological threat and belonging concerns and how these can produce persistent performance decrements, which through feedback loops can increase over time. The character of such processes may be revealed only over time because they are recursive in nature and interact with other factors in chronically evaluative social environments. Finally, we address how this model helped in the development of successful interventions.