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Using the shifting standards model of stereotype‐based judgments to examine the impact of race on compensation decisions
Author(s) -
Weeks Matthew,
Weeks Kelly P.,
Watkins Emily C.
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
journal of applied social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.822
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1559-1816
pISSN - 0021-9029
DOI - 10.1111/jasp.12724
Subject(s) - psychology , compensation (psychology) , social psychology , race (biology) , stereotype (uml) , white (mutation) , context (archaeology) , wage , economics , sociology , gender studies , paleontology , biochemistry , chemistry , biology , gene , market economy
The Shifting Standards Model (SSM) of stereotypic judgments is presented as a model of implicit bias that produces a psychological mechanism contributing to continued racial wage disparities. The SSM is used to explain race‐based differences in subjective evaluations of compensation decisions. We report three experimental studies in which research participants made compensation decisions for either a White or Black employee. Across three studies, participants judged a Black employee's raise as subjectively better than a comparably described White employee's raise. Participants who work in Human Resources fields (Study 3) and those with experience making compensation decisions (Study 2) were as likely as other participants to show evidence of the shifting standards effect. The findings are discussed in the context of individual implicit biases contributing to continued wage disparities and potential organizational practices to ameliorate these influences.