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Psychological Science: Taking White Racial Emotions Seriously—Revisiting the Costs of Racism to White Americans

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Impacts of Racism on White Americans In the Age of Trump

Abstract

Lisa B. Spanierman and D. Anthony Clark empirically demonstrate the psychosocial costs of racism to Whites (PCRW) theory. White Americans face negative cognitive, affective, and behavioral consequences of racism because they are in the dominant societal position. The PCRW scale measures the affective costs of racism to Whites. We learn that White empathy, guilt, and fear are meaningful aspects of White Americans’ racial experiences. And when we consider White empathy, guilt, and fear in combination, five different types of White Americans emerge regarding racial orientation. These types range from blatantly racist and insensitive to those who are empathic and anti-racist.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    When we write “people of color” and “communities of color,” recognizing their rhetorical shortcomings, we use shorthand to refer to both individuals and communities of color and Indigenous Peoples.

  2. 2.

    We also explain a statistical clustering approach that uses the costs of racism scale scores to identify five types of White people.

  3. 3.

    The scale garnered initial psychometric support from a large, college-student sample (Spanierman and Heppner 2004), and subsequent investigations demonstrated adequate reliability and validity primarily among college undergraduate and graduate students (Case 2007; Chao et al. 2015; Garriott et al. 2016; Mekawi et al. 2016; Paone et al. 2015; Sifford et al. 2009; Spanierman et al. 2006; Spanierman et al. 2008; Todd et al. 2011; Turner 2011). Additional validation studies examined the psychometric properties of the scale among a geographically dispersed sample of employed adults (Poteat and Spanierman 2008), Ashkenazi Jews (Berk 2015), and sexual minority men (Kleiman et al. 2015).

  4. 4.

    Cluster analysis is a statistical approach that classifies data into groups to maximize similarity within a group and dissimilarity across groups.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Counseling and Counseling Psychology, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA

    Lisa B. Spanierman

  2. Interdisciplinary Humanities and Communication, Arizona State University, Mesa, AZ, USA

    D. Anthony Clark

Authors
  1. Lisa B. Spanierman
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  2. D. Anthony Clark
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Correspondence to Lisa B. Spanierman .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. California State University, East Bay, Hayward, CA, USA

    Duke W. Austin

  2. California State University, East Bay, Hayward, CA, USA

    Benjamin P. Bowser

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Spanierman, L.B., Clark, D.A. (2021). Psychological Science: Taking White Racial Emotions Seriously—Revisiting the Costs of Racism to White Americans. In: Austin, D.W., Bowser, B.P. (eds) Impacts of Racism on White Americans In the Age of Trump. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-75232-3_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-75232-3_8

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-75231-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-75232-3

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