Identity Safety or Threat? Outgroup Diversity Initiatives Can Create Threat Among White Women

Although diversity initiatives can signal identity safety for individuals with stigmatized identities, they often elicit threat responses from dominant group members. How do individuals possessing both a dominant and a non-dominant identity perceive diversity initiatives targeting a stigmatized outgroup? Drawing from literature on the identity safety cue transfer effect and social identity theory, this research examined White women’s responses to organizational diversity initiatives targeting Black Americans. White women indicated less interest and anticipated less inclusion in an organization with an initiative for Black Americans (Studies 1a and 1b). They also expressed less interest and inclusion when reading an initiative that exerted strong outgroup benefit, but not when reading an initiative that exerted a weak outgroup benefit (Study 2). The negative effects of strong outgroup benefit condition was larger among participants who endorsed high zero-sum beliefs. These findings suggest that people may only experience identity safety when an initiative implies potential downstream benefits to their own group. It also highlights the need to consider the complex interplay of social identities in response to diversity initiatives.