Dr. Kurt Gray, an Assistant Professor of Social Psychology and Dr. B. Keith Payne, a Full Professor of Social Psychology, are the co-recipients of a Russell Sage Foundation grant.
The Russell Sage Foundation was established in 1907 for the improvement of social and living conditions in the United States. The Russell Sage Foundation awards grants in the program of Race, Ethnicity, and Immigration, a program that encourages multi-disciplinary perspectives on questions stemming from the significant changes in the racial, ethnic, and immigrant-origin composition of the U.S. population. The Russell Sage Foundation awards research proposals on the social, economic, and political effects of this changing composition of the population, including the transformation of communities and ideas about what it means to be an American.
Drs. Gray and Payne received a total award of over $135,000 (over two years) for their project, “Cast as a Criminal: How Moral Typecasting Leads to Racial Prejudice.” Dr. Gray and Dr. Payne will explore whether moral typecasting can help explain aggressive law enforcement tactics towards non-whites, especially black men. They will examine the role of typecasting in in situations of heightened ambiguity, such as adolescence and whether this leads law enforcement to be biased against black adolescent males.