Older women in the United States are not stereotyped along a single dimension. A new study of how age and race intersect finds that the most distinctive part of a woman's identity tends to dominate the traits people associate with her. Researchers asked 525 Amazon Mechanical Turk participants to list up to five words or short phrases that most people would associate with women who were older and identified as White, Black, or Arab.
The goal was to test whether stereotype content for an intersectional group follows from its superordinate racial identity, its superordinate older-age identity, or a distinctive blend of the two. Under this account, the identity that stands out most within a given cultural context drives the characteristics assigned to the intersectional group. Old White women illustrated the pattern clearly.
Because being White is common in the United States, whiteness carries little distinctiveness, and stereotypes of old White women overlapped more with those of older adults in general than with those of White people in general. The authors suggest that a nation's population characteristics may help predict which stereotypes attach to different intersectional groups. The study focused on perceptions of women and on three racial categories, so the findings speak to that scope rather than to all intersectional combinations.
Participants were online workers generating associations, which captures commonly held stereotypes rather than any individual's personal beliefs. Overall, the research maps the complex interplay between age and racial stereotypes for women, underscoring the need to acknowledge intersectional identities and cultural norms in pursuit of more inclusive and accurate societal perceptions.
Subject of Research: Intersectional stereotypes of older women across White, Black, and Arab racial identities in the United States
Article Title: Intersectional stereotypes: How age and race shape perceptions of women in the United States
Article References: Gans, H., Bergstrom, V. N. Z., Thakkar, D., & Chasteen, A. L. (2026). Intersectional stereotypes: How age and race shape perceptions of women in the United States. PLOS One, 21(10), e0361210. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0361210
Image Credits: AI Generated
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0361210
Keywords: stereotypes, intersectionality, ageism, race, older women, social perception, distinctiveness hypothesis, United States, social psychology, crowdsourcing, Intersectional, shape
Cite Scienmag News
Gemma Drummond. (October 27, 2026). Age and Race Combine to Shape Stereotypes of American Women. Scienmag. https://scienmag.com/age-and-race-combine-to-shape-stereotypes-of-american-women/
Gemma Drummond. "Age and Race Combine to Shape Stereotypes of American Women." Scienmag, 27 October 2026, https://scienmag.com/age-and-race-combine-to-shape-stereotypes-of-american-women/. Accessed 27 October 2026.
Gemma Drummond. "Age and Race Combine to Shape Stereotypes of American Women." Scienmag. October 27, 2026. https://scienmag.com/age-and-race-combine-to-shape-stereotypes-of-american-women/
