3-165 - “Why is a White Guy Interested in Racial Discrimination?”: The Role of the Researcher's Social Identity in Developmental Science

Session Type: Conversation Roundtable

Integrative Statement

While developmental psychology has recently started to value and investigate the influence that research participants’ race, culture, and social identity has on their developmental outcomes, less attention has been given to the importance of the sociodemographic characteristics and social identity of the researcher in the conceptualization, execution, and dissemination of developmental science. In the qualitative psychology literature, there is an emphasis on reflexivity, or the open and introspective analysis of an investigator’s role in the research study as an essential element in the framing and the qualification of knowledge gained from a given study. Researchers in developmental psychology appear split on their approach to reflexivity: some scholars believe that the influence of the individual researcher should be minimized, rendering their research practically objective, while others suggest that research is indelibly affected by their identity and that investigators have the responsibility to be transparent about this process. In fact, some researchers believe that science can even be a form of social activism where an investigator purposefully produces studies that align with a social imperative involving the participants with whom they work. The issue of reflexivity is particularly salient in research with communities of color for whom researchers’ decisions can have profound and possibly negative consequences for historically exploited research participants. This roundtable convenes a diverse group of experts studying communities of color to engage in a dialogue about the influence of the social identity of the researcher and whether and how this influences the approach to and execution of developmental science.

Sub Unit

• Race, Ethnicity, Culture, Context

Moderator

• Devin English, George Washington University

Panelists

• Nancy L Deutsch, University of Virginia

• Lionel Howard, George Washington University

• Michael Strambler, Yale University

• Deborah Rivas-Drake, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor