The Role of Educational Background in Dating Between Black and White People
摘要
Analyzing current Black–White relations gives a deeper understanding of the United States’ shifting ethnoracial relations and how to overcome divides between these two groups. This study assesses how impactful having a Black identity, in comparison with other ethnoracial minority identities, is in the overall experience of being on the online dating market from the vantage point of White people. Further, educational background has an unclear, yet salient, influence in the formation of romantic relationships. This study also examines whether a prospective White dater’s educational background plays a moderating role in their willingness to date Black people, relative to other ethnoracial minorities through a quantitative analysis based on White participants’ responses in a 2022–2023 original survey experiment which manipulated the ethnoracial identity of individuals featured in online dating profiles. Black women seem to have a substantial disadvantage relative to Native American women and have a marginally significant general penalty relative to other tested ethnoracial identities while Black men are at a marginal advantage compared to men of particular ethnoracial backgrounds. Evidence points to White respondents with a high school-level degree or less, relative to respondents with higher levels of education, are most likely to penalize Black women on the dating market. Black people’s experiences in the online dating market seem to be gendered with Black women facing hurdles that Black men seem to not face. With respect to Black women, exposure to higher education among White people may encourage bonds between Black and White people in an increasingly ethnoracially diverse society.