Stereotype Threat or a Lack of Control(s)? Evaluating Robustness Against Changes in Specifications

Abstract

Affirmative action in higher education has been controversial since 1961. The Source of the River (Douglas Massey and Fischer (2003)) uses the National Longitudinal Survey of Freshmen—a demographic and socioeconomic survey of nearly 4,000 students entering 28 highly selective colleges in 1999—to evaluate explanations of minority underachievement in college. The authors develop two measures of vulnerability to stereotype threat. The authors focus on the stereotype threat hypothesis, and conclude that stereotype threat undermines minority achievement. We replicate their results, and investigate the robustness of their specification. We find that their main conclusion is fragile: controlling for other demographic characteristics, the effect of stereotype threat becomes statistically insignificant.