The Nerd Penalty

Some academically successful minorities suffer social consequences at school.  

American schools are facing an “achievement gap,” say researchers from the University of Michigan who studied the relationship between race, academic performance, and socialization. Findings show that African American and Native American students who perform well in school are at greater risk of suffering from what study authors call a “nerd penalty” than do their white, Hispanic and Asian counterparts.

“I believe that racial dynamics within schools are having an important influence on the achievement of minority students,” he tells demodirt.com. “Although racial dynamics are subtle, and controversial, and not always easy to study, I believe that it is important for researchers to keep trying to understand what is going on.”

The survey of a nationally representative sample of 13,000 U.S. adolescents from more than 100 schools nationwide asked students in grades seven through twelve several questions about their feelings on how well they fared socially. Students were asked to describe how often they felt lonely, and how often they felt students were unfriendly to them or didn’t like them.

Fuller-Rowell and co-author Stacey Doan of Boston University used the students’ grade point averages to determine academic success, and then compared the students’ self-reported social standing and GPAs over the span of a year. The researchers also controlled for factors such as socioeconomic status, family structure, and school safety and size.

White students with high GPAs reported greater feelings of social acceptance, including fewer instances of feeling lonely or disliked by their peers—indicating a positive relationship between GPA and social success.   For their high-achieving African American and Native American peers, however, the opposite relationship existed. These students reported more bouts of loneliness and incidents in which they felt disliked by their classmates.    

The research demonstrated no sex differences, meaning that academically successful boys and girls in these groups are equally at risk to suffer social isolation.

Why are black and Native American achievers suffering negative social ramifications for their success?

To improve racial relations in the schools, Fuller-Rowel recommends that parties discuss issues in an open but “non-confrontational” manner.

“School administrators, counselors, and teachers should be discussing the racial dynamics within their schools amongst themselves and with students,” he advises. “These discussions will need to be advised and directed to some extent by trained professionals with a background in facilitation, minority issues, and inter-group dynamics.”

“Many whites, for example, prefer to believe that racial issues are a thing of the past and that it does not do any good to continue talking about them,” he explains.

This perspective makes progress impossible, he maintains.

“These kinds of attitudes are what stifle dialog and create a silence around issues of race, which fuels the flames of an unhealthy racial dynamic within schools,” Fuller Rowel contends.