THE EFFECTS OF GROUP STATUS AND INTERPERSONAL POWER ON TARGETS' RESPONSES TO IDENTITY MISCATEGORIZATION

Abstract

In most situations the way individuals categorize their own identities is consistent with the way others categorize their identities. While this is often the case, some situations involve others ascribing an incorrect identity to individuals. Recent research has begun to investigate individuals' reactions to this experience of identity miscategorization. The goal of this dissertation is to expand on this previous research by examining how relative group status and relative interpersonal power differences influence individuals' response to identity miscategorization. This dissertation consists of four studies: two that investigate how relative group status impacts targets' reactions to identity miscategorization and two that investigate how relative interpersonal power impacts targets' reactions to identity miscategorization. Study 1 involves Asian participants being primed to believe that their ethnic group is of relatively high status or low status, or not being primed with status, and ostensibly having their ethnicity miscategorized or correctly categorized. Study 2 utilizes a similar procedure to that of Study 1, though Study 2 manipulates categorization via a vignette, and expands on Study 1 by investigating the identity miscategorization of participants' major identity, by including an identity denial condition, and by investigating how participants' level of identity impacts the relationship between status and miscategorization. Findings indicate that targets who are miscategorized as a member of a relatively low status group find this experience to be particularly negative. Study 3 involves Asian and Latino participants having relatively higher power, lower power, or equal power to a partner who either correctly categorizes or incorrectly categorizes the participants' ethnicity. Study 4 utilizes a similar procedure to that of Study 3 and, similar to the way that Study 2 expands on Study 1, expands on Study 3 by investigating the

identity miscategorization of participants' major and by examining how participants' level of identity impacts the relationship between power and identity miscategorization. Findings from these studies show that relatively low power targets find miscategorization to be particularly negative and that relatively high power targets are buffered from the negative consequences of miscategorization.