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ERIC Number: EJ1251247
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2020-Jun
Pages: 13
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1938-8926
EISSN: N/A
Undergraduate Students' Perceptions of Diversity over Time
Dingel, Molly J.; Sage, Starr K.
Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, v13 n2 p120-132 Jun 2020
The United States is an increasingly diverse nation. It is therefore critical to cultivate an appreciation of racial difference. To bridge lay understandings with the reality of racial inequality, we must understand the ways citizens think about diversity and contextualize these within our current racial structure. In this paper, we interviewed 32 first- and second-year college students about their perceptions of diversity and, in the context of diversity, how well they fit in at their university. We reinterviewed 18 of these students 2 years later, when they were in their third or fourth year in college. We found that these students classified a wide range of traits under the concept of diversity. With respect to race, students exhibited a high degree of what Eduardo Bonilla-Silva describes as color-blind racism. Beyond that, we found that although students' attitudes about diversity were quite stable over these 2 years, there were interesting changes. Namely, students' introduction of learning styles and career goals in the second interviews reflects both the depth with which individuals' concepts of difference and diversity are deeply embedded in their social context, and that color-blind ideology is flexible enough to incorporate these context-specific frameworks.
American Psychological Association. Journals Department, 750 First Street NE, Washington, DC 20002. Tel: 800-374-2721; Tel: 202-336-5510; Fax: 202-336-5502; e-mail: order@apa.org; Web site: http://www.apa.org
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A