title: The Power of Affirming Group Values: Group Affirmation Buffers the Self-Esteem of Women Exposed to Blatant Sexism.
abstract: Extending the group affirmation literature to the domain of prejudice, this study investigated whether group affirmation buffers the self-esteem of women exposed to blatant sexism. In accordance with Self-Affirmation Theory (Steele, 1988) and group affirmation research (Sherman et al., 2007), we hypothesized that when one aspect of the collective self is threatened (gender identity), self-esteem can be maintained via the affirmation of an alternative aspect of the collective self. In a 2×2 between-participants design, female students were randomly assigned to read about discrimination directed toward women or a non-self-relevant disadvantaged group (the Inuit). All then participated in a (fictitious) second study, in which half completed a group affirmation manipulation (wrote about the top three values of a self-defining group) and half completed a control writing exercise. The self-esteem of women who were threatened by sexism, but group affirmed, was protected from the negative effects of perceiving sexism.
authors.affiliation: California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Julie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Spencer-Rodgers
authors.affiliation: University of California, Santa Barbara, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Brenda
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Major
authors.affiliation: University of Miami, Coral Cables, FL, USA.
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Forster
authors.affiliation: Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Kaiping
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Peng
keywords: gender identity; group affirmation; self-esteem; sexism