Gendered race prototypes: Evidence for the non-prototypicality of Asian men and Black women

Previous research from the perspective of gendered race theory has demonstrated that stereotypes about race often contain a gendered component, whereby certain racial and ethnic groups are stereotyped as more masculine or feminine. In particular, in North American contexts, Blacks tend to be associated with masculinity, while Asians tend to be associated with femininity. In this paper we present the hypothesis that Asian men and Black women are deemed less prototypical of their overarching racial groups due to the mismatch between their identities and gendered race stereotypes. First, we show evidence demonstrating that Asian men face invisibility at the cognitive level, consistent with previous theory and research related to Black women (Study 1). Second, we present direct evidence that participants are more likely to imagine a man when thinking of a Black individual and less likely to think of a man when imagining an Asian individual, relative to the frequency of Whites (Study 2). Overall, our results support the hypothesis that Asian men and Black women are viewed as less prototypical of their race categories. We discuss implications and future directions for work on intersectionality and gendered race theory.