Lighter Skin, More Like Me
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Do white people like Obama because he's "light-skinded" ?
 by Marc Ambinder
A dart in the evolving science of perception and race: a new study suggests that self-described partisanship influences how a candidate with biracial skin tone is evaluated. The biracial candidate in question, of course, is Barack Obama. In a study published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers found that self-described liberals looked at artificially lightened photographs of President Barack Obama and judged them as more representative of his actual likeness, while self-described conservative students more often chose artificially darkened photos of Obama.
First, researchers showed students a picture of a biracial man. They were told that the person was a candidate for a government job. Some in the group were told that the man supported their views; others weren’t. Those who were told that the person supported their views were more likely to judge a lightened version of the person as more representative of the person’s actual likeness. Those who were not rated a darkened photograph as more representative. “The more people considered the lighter versions of the candidate as representative of him, the stronger their stated intentions of voting for him.”
The findings held for a candidate that all the participants knew about — Barack Obama. Photos of him were shown before the presidential election. Working backwards, the researchers wanted to know whether photographs of Obama scored as “light” were correlated with the degree of support for him regardless of underlying political orientation. The researchers created a “conservatism” score, and performed a regression analysis. The more “people considered the lighter skin tone as representative of a candidate who shared their own ideology, the stronger their stated intentions of voting for that candidate.” A third part of the study theorized that people with ingrained racial prejudice would see Obama and vote against automatically, and that the correlation was simply a matter of prejudice. Controlling for overt racial attitudes, however, the difference persisted.
The basic conclusion: the more you like a candidate, the more likely you are to “lighten” a photograph of him or her. The less likely you like a candidate, the more likely you are to “darken a photograph.”
“The results from three studies suggest that political partisanship can shape which perceptual depictions of a biracial candidate people see as most representative of who he really is. Our data suggest that people’s perceptions of skin tone for both novel and known candidates are systematically related to their stated voting intentions and reported voting behavior, such that both are positively correlated with the extent to which people see lighter skin tone as representative of the candidate. Across the three studies reported here, we found that partisans not only ”darken” those with whom they disagree, but also ”lighten” those with whom they agree. Future research should aim to clarify the specific relationship between skin tone perception and voting behavior, to determine whether ”coloring” a biracial candidate’s skin tone plays a causal role in the relationship between political partisanship and voting behavior.”
Eugene Caruso, an assistant professor of behavioral science at Chicago Booth; Emily Balcetis, an assistant professor of psychology at NYU; and Nicole Mead, a postdoctoral fellow at Tilburg University, were the lead authors of the study.
courtesy of The Atlantic
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Maybe in most other countries but not in the good ole USA. It would be very hard for a black man to get much lighter then Micheal Jackson and yet white people in American never took him as one of their own and the same goes for Obama that old law that one once of black blood make you a black person might not be written in the books as a law but its written on the mind of white America. Obama could´t go to Iowa and just blend into the crowd like a white man.
> butch
He looks white as much as he looks blacks.
Still not sure why he considered the first black president.
You ever notice he looks like the Rock Duane Johnson?
> Carl Amnito
Carl with all do respect you must not live in America.
> butch
I do Butch, I live in sunny NY
He looks more Hawiian than black, which I associate as being whiter that black, no?
I am just saying he is no more black than he is white.
> Carl Amnito
I want to Thank you for the insightful Blog/Study, to say the least I’m Not surprised at the results. This is no different than the Afrikan (Black) children choosing the white dolls as being more pretty or nicer than the black dolls. That particular study was done about three times All concluding the same things, we as Black People Do Not Love who we are. Why because we’ve been systematically trained to love others and hate ourselves by those who enslaved us. (europeans)
This study I presume was done on adults of different races I can Only presume so it goes across the board of course child or adult.. if your Black get back if your brown stick around… you know the rest.
I say to All my Afrikan/Black People Love your people and who you are our challenges as a people are much deeper than we think, we can and will rise but we must begin with first a Proper Education/Knowledge of Self. If we don’t know ourselves we won’t and can’t love ourselves.
A wise man once said you don’t have to tell or force people to love Afrika just suggest that they read some True history of Afrika and if they do they have no choice but to come back in love with Africa and her people.
Thanks!
http://www.BlackPowerProductions.com
Bro Gary
> Bro Gary
Hi Carl
Point taken. It would be nice if all people of this world had the same thinking. He´s not black and he is not white let call him a human being just like you and i and everybody else.
> butch
Exactly Butch!
I fear that the election of BHO (to no fault of his own) has created a bigger racial divide.
Whites and Blacks taking a side for the wrong reasons.
Bro Gary is 99% on the money. Great positive message. Every race should learn of their heritage and roots. All races should be proud to be white, black, yellow, red.
Each race has unique qualities that contribute to society. Build on these things, become an example of your true culture.
I think Bro Gary slipped up by throwing in the “poor me” comment. We all need to get out of two destructive mindsets.
One: Don’t play the victim. If you stop playing the victim you will not be treated like a victim.
Two: Resist the idea of “one people”. For if you buy into multi centralism you are effectively killing off your race/heritage and that will make everyone “the same”. China, Russia, Africa, Jewish, and Mexico all see the value in preserving their race.
Why is the concept of one people a bad thing you ask?
I mentioned all races/ethnicities have unique perspectives and talents. When you melt them all together you get dulled down versions of Blacks, Whites, Yellows, etc.
Doesn’t make for a strong America. America was built on the talents of individual races.
Yes there will be tensions, but I fear that an America of people who are all the same, you will lose entrepreneurs, strong thinkers, special attributes from each race.
I encourage all races to be proud, be the best you can be and make this country the better place we know it can be. Flush the politicians and think for your self!
> Carl Amnito
Carl it so strange how we live in one the most technological advanced societies that has ever lived and were thousands of years out of evolution but yet so much of our thinking is very primitives most of our divisions are based on words that have no action just puffs of air words like color or ism´s or church, we use words to divide. Maybe it will take another thousand year for people to understand how simple our problems are but i don´t think we have that much time or what we call time to understand we need a new evolution that brings about a new way of thinking.
> butch
I Thank you Carl for the kind words but I have to respond to your comment that I came off as crying “Poor Me.. and victim..” I wasn’t trying to imply poor me at all as a matter of fact I reread the post and I don’t see where you get that from but I will say this about the Victims comment.
Afrikan People are victims of the most horrific atrocities history has recorded. If someone comes into your house tonight and knocks you upside the head rapes All the women in your house kills your father, then beats your children half to death before kidnapping them and leaving the rest of the family there for dead.. I think you would say “My Family was victimized.” If a woman is raped she’s considered to have been a victim… Why are Afrikan People wrong or crying when they say they’ve been victimized and continue to be.
Saying you’re a victim doesn’t mean your saying helpless or hopeless, it means you’ve been violated and anyone that says Afrika and her children haven’t been violated is living in a box.
Sorry to stray from the topic a bit but, I had to respond to that.
Thanks
Gary
> Bro Gary
…
there were white people running for office……
this is stupid
why would white people just vote white if the were looking for the comfortable decision?
again, this is stupid
> victorious questioner
Give it up, bro gary.
> gummo
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