White Perceptions of Whether African Americans and Hispanics are Prone to Violence and Support for the Death Penalty

Abstract

Objective: To explore whether the impact of racial and ethnic pejorative stereotypes and prejudice on White support for the death penalty changes over time. Methods: The data were drawn from the 1990 and 2000 General Social Surveys. This trend analysis included a four-item racial–ethnic prejudice scale and two stereotype or “typification” measures that assessed the extent to which the respondents believed that African Americans and Hispanics were more prone to violence than Whites. Controls were introduced for standard demographic measures and for known covariates of punitiveness, such as conservative political ideology and religious beliefs and involvement. The dependent variable was whether the respondents favored the death penalty for persons convicted of murder. Results: The analyses revealed that racial and ethnic prejudice increases Whites' embrace of capital punishment in both periods of time. By contrast, the negative stereotypes that typify African Americans and Hispanics as prone to violence exerted a significant impact on support for the death penalty in 1990 but not in 2000. Conclusions: These findings suggest that Whites' views on minority group members' proneness to violence potentially shift over time and exert significant impacts on death penalty support depending on the broader social context that prevails at a given historical juncture. Racial–ethnic feelings of animus appear to be a stable, if not intractable source of punitiveness. Future research should continue to unpack the complex nature of Whites' racial and ethnic views and to explore how, in given sociopolitical contexts, they potentially serve to justify punitive policy agendas.

Keywords

public opinion race/ethnicity punishment

Using the General Social Survey (GSS) and building on the extant research (Barkan and Cohn 2005; Chiricos, Welch, and Gertz 2004; Nielsen, Bonn, and Wilson 2010; Peffley, Hurwitz, and Sniderman 1997; Welch et al. 2011), we examine the degree to which White Americans perceive African Americans and Hispanics as prone to violent behavior. Associating racial and ethnic groups with violence could be considered as an expression of the “modern racism” or laissez-faire racism that reproduces and legitimates racial stratification (Bobo 2004; Bonilla-Silva 2006; Chiricos and Eschholz 2002; Feagin 2001; Picca and Feagin 2007). It provides the dominant group—Whites, in the case of the United States—with the ability to be critical of minority groups, such as African Americans and Hispanics, while professing to being nonracists (e.g., “We dislike blacks not because we are prejudiced but because they are more violent”) (Lynch 2006).

While damaging on their own, racist attitudes and their expression via negative racial depictions could become even more toxic if they infuse White Americans with a desire to harshly punish criminals. The result of such a possible insidious relationship is that White Americans will support more strident crime control policies because they believe that these measures will disproportionately imprison minorities. Support for this hypothesis would require two empirical realities. First, researchers would have to find that White Americans negatively depict African Americans as crime prone—that is, violent or aggressive; and, second, they would have to show that these pejorative depictions of African Americans significantly predict support for punitive crime control policies, while controlling for other possible explanations.

In this context, we investigate whether support for a punitive crime control policy—that is, support for the death penalty—is significantly related (1) to White pejorative depictions of African Americans and Hispanics as being prone to violence and (2) to more general prejudicial attitudes (Welch 2007). This approach allows us to probe whether the desire to use capital punishment among Whites is tied to general prejudicial attitudes or is related to the negative typification of Hispanics and African Americans as being prone to violence (Welch et al. 2011).

Consistent with the potentially dynamic nature of prejudicial attitudes, we additionally extend the prior research by investigating the impact of perceived proneness to violence—which we term racial and ethnic stereotyping or “typification”—on support for the death penalty at two points in time: 1990 and 2000. These years present two distinct times in the history of the United States; that is, two dates in time characterized by historical highs and lows in rates of violent crime.

These considerations allow us to explore whether the extent to which support for the death penalty is related to prejudicial attitudes and negative racial and ethnic stereotypes about violence proneness changes over time. We initially examined the time dimension because of a suspicion that, while global feelings of prejudice might have stable effects, racial–ethnic typifications might become more salient and elevate support for the death penalty when the threat of crime was objectively more real and more often socially constructed as a leading problem. However, this is speculative on our part. Existing theories of punitiveness are silent on this issue, in part because they do not consider race–ethnicity as a central dynamic in their explanation (Unnever and Cullen 2010a). Further, to our knowledge, the extant research has limited its focus to whether negative typifications of minorities and general prejudicial attitudes impact punitive beliefs at a single point in time (see, e.g., Barkan and Cohn 2005; Chiricos et al. 2004; Welch et al. 2011). Indeed, left unexamined, such research leaves the impression that prejudicial attitudes and the negative typifications of African Americans and Hispanics by Whites remain constant across time and that harboring such pejorative stereotypes and racial–ethnic animus will uniformly increase Whites' support for the death penalty.

Three other considerations inform our analysis. First, following Unnever and Cullen (2007b), we frame our analysis of the impact of negative stereotypes from the perspective of the dominant group by creating “White-centric” measures of proneness to violence. Levels of crime—and thus of possible dangerousness and threat—do not simply have absolute values but are assessed in comparison to a norm. All groups display some involvement in crime; the issue is whether a group is seen as relatively more violent and thus as a special threat to the prevailing social order. In the United States, the normative standard is established by the dominant group. This is not to say that Whites are never troubled by the criminality of members of their own racial group. Still, when judging out-group members, the salient consideration is whether they are seen as relatively unthreatening or as posing a special potential group threat through their perceived willingness to use violence. In our analysis, we use a measure of racial and ethnic stereotypes that contrasts the extent to which White respondents view African Americans and Hispanics as prone to violence relative to their own group (Weaver 2005). Consequently, we argue that a racial or ethnic typification of violence occurs when the dominant group believes that African Americans and Hispanics commit more crime than Whites; that is, it is when the dominant group believes “it is not us but them who commit all the crime …” (Loury 2004, 2008).

Second, we more closely examine the now well-documented relationship between racial animus and punitive attitudes (for a review of this literature, see Unnever, Cullen, and Jonson 2008). We add to this research. While the prior research has established that there is an association between racial animus and punitive attitudes, it has not fleshed out the reasons for this relationship. In fact, scholars have suggested that the salient reason why White racists are more likely to endorse get tough correctional policies is that they conflate race with crime and crime with race (see, e.g., Beckett and Sasson 2003). Indeed, Unnever and Cullen (2009a) ground their theoretical model of individual differences in punitive attitudes on the assumption that racist Whites believe African Americans are more prone to engage in crime and therefore are more deserving to be punished. Yet, few studies have empirically examined whether the association between racial prejudice and support for capital punishment results from the pejorative depiction of African Americans as prone to violence. Our article adds to this literature by testing this well-recognized, widely assumed but limited tested hypothesis.

Third, we assess White views on the violent proneness not only of African Americans but also of Hispanics, a group largely ignored by the prior research on the relationship between the typification of crime and support for the death penalty. Thus, we assess whether Whites typify Hispanics as more prone to violence than members of their own race and whether this potential pejorative depiction changes across time. In addition, we examine whether the relationship between racial and ethnic animus and support for capital punishment results from Whites expressing the belief that African Americans and Hispanics are more prone to violence than members of their own race. If prejudiced Whites support punitive policies only because they believe these two minorities are prone to violence, then any direct effect on support for the death penalty of a general assessment of racial–ethnic animus should be proven spurious when the measure of violent stereotypes of African Americans and Hispanics is entered into the analysis.

Racial and Ethnic Stereotypes and Support for the Death Penalty

Stereotypes of African Americans as Being Violent

Scholars argue that a prevailing pejorative depiction of African Americans and, perhaps to a lesser degree, of Hispanics is that they are prone to violence or criminal behavior (Harris 1977). The empirical research on stereotypes of African Americans supports this claim (Devine 1989; Trawalter et al. 2008; Wood and Chesser 1994). Devine and Elliot (1995:1142), in a follow-up to the classic Princeton trilogy studies, provided 147 White students a checklist composed of 93 adjectives and asked them to mark those that “make up the cultural stereotype of Blacks.” Note that, based on recent free-response data, they decided to add the concepts of “criminal” and “hostile” to the original checklist of 84 adjectives constructed prior to the 1970s.

This research generated three findings relevant to the current project. First, Devine and Elliot found that from 1933 to the mid-1990s, negative stereotypes of African Americans endured. Second, they report that the specific content of these negative typifications changed over time. And, third, they found that the newly added adjectives “criminal” and “hostile” were in the top 10 of those that were frequently identified, 7 and 9 respectively (the number 1 identified adjective was “athletic”) (see also Greenwald, Oakes, and Hoffman 2003). Together, these findings indicate that Whites persist in negatively stereotyping Blacks, that their pejorative depictions can change over time, and that their current negative typification includes the portrayal that African Americans are prone to hostile and criminal behavior.

Stereotypes of Hispanics as Being Violent

The research on White stereotypes of Hispanics is not as fully developed as the literature on African Americans. For example, most of it has sampled university students, and it has generally ignored the possibility that Whites may recognize different ethnicities among Hispanics (e.g., Cubans, Columbians, Mexicans, Chicanos, Puerto Ricans; see Marin 1984; Martinez and Valenzuela 2006), which our research also fails to do. However, the extant literature indicates that: (1) Whites have constructed gendered negative stereotypes of Hispanics, (2) that they have deep historical roots, and (3) that these stereotypes include depictions of Hispanic men as being violent (Bender 2003; Castro 2006; Hagan and Palloni 1999; Holmes et al. 2008; Martinez and Valenzuela 2006; Portillos 2006; Samora 1971).

Marin (1984) used a free-response question format and found that the primary characteristic assigned to all Hispanic groups by 100 college students of different races and ethnicities was “aggressive”; 64 percent of the respondents assigned this attribute to “Chicanos.” Niemann et al. (1994) report that an ethnically diverse group of 259 college students associated Mexican American males, but not females, as being “antagonistic,” “criminal,” and “alcohol users.” Esqueda (1997) surveyed 80 White students and found that the respondents typified violent crimes and property crimes, especially shoplifting, with Hispanics as well as with African Americans. More recently, Esqueda, Espinoza, and Culhane (2008) conducted two experiments involving 240 White (European Americans) students that asked them to act as jurors in actual criminal cases. They varied the ethnicity of the defendant between a White and Mexican American male defendant, while presenting the respondents with similar characteristics of the court case. Esqueda et al. (2008) report that compared with similarly situated White offenders, White students were more likely to perceive Hispanic defendants with low socioeconomic status as more blameworthy, to find them guilty more often, and to give them longer sentences. It is also noteworthy that scholars have found that Hispanics are disproportionately presented on the TV news as criminal suspects and in threatening contexts (see, e.g., Bender 2003; Chiricos and Eschholz 2002). Together, these studies suggest that individuals tend to pejoratively stereotype Hispanics and that these negative depictions include associating Hispanic men with violence.

Support for the Death Penalty

Unnever and Cullen (2009a) have put forth a theoretical model that explains individual differences in punitiveness. A core assumption of their model is that individuals who are the most likely to support punitive crime control policies (e.g., the death penalty) are those who conflate crime with minorities—that is, the “criminal-other” (see also Unnever and Cullen 2010a). Their model hypothesizes that individuals who typify crime with minorities therefore believe that the crime policies they support will disproportionately negatively affect those specific minorities. Thus, Unnever and Cullen (2009a) hypothesize that support for crime control policies is infused with racial–ethnic animus that includes the typification of minorities as criminal. A hypothesis derived from their model—which we test—is whether Whites typify racial and ethnic groups (i.e., African Americans and Hispanics) as being more prone to violence than members of their own race and whether these toxic typifications are related to their support for capital punishment.

But, unexpectedly, we could locate few studies that have investigated, using national polling data, whether Whites that endorse racial and ethnic typifications of crime are more willing to support punitive crime control policies (Quillian 2006). In 2002, Chiricos et al. (2004) conducted a national random sample of 885 adults and investigated whether a measure of the racial typification of crime significantly impacted punitive attitudes. Their measure of whether Americans typify crime with African Americans was based on an index that summed across three questions: (1) “What percent of people who commit violent crimes in this country would you say are black?” (2) “When you think about people who break into homes and businesses when nobody is there, approximately what percent would you say are black?” And (3) “When you think about people who rob other people at gunpoint, approximately what percent would you say are black?” Chiricos et al. (2004) found that one of their most salient predictors of punitive attitudes was their racial typification measure. They also tested for a number of interactions and found that the slope differences for one interaction term were significant; that is, the impact of racial typification on punitiveness was significantly greater among those who were not that concerned about crime.

Peffley et al. (1997) analyzed the 1991 National Race and Politics Survey and found that Whites were more likely to support Black criminal suspects being stopped and searched if they embraced the stereotype that African Americans were hostile and used foul language. Unexpectedly, however, they found that Whites who were confronted with disconfirming information—African Americans who were well behaved and not using foul language—“bent over backwards” to afford them more rights. That is, Whites judged Whites more harshly than similarly situated African Americans when they were confronted with information that was inconsistent with their stereotype of Blacks. Similar to our study, Peffley et al.’s (1997) stereotype of African Americans centered on whether Whites perceived them as violent or aggressive (they also examined the stereotype of whether Whites perceived African Americans as lazy, undependable, and lacking discipline).

Tangentially related, using the 2000 GSS, Barkan and Cohn (2005) report that White respondents are more likely to support spending money to reduce crime when they stereotype African Americans as prone to violence but not when they similarly negatively depict Hispanics, while controlling for other factors (e.g., gender, age, education).¹ Additionally, they found that the relationship between support for spending more money to reduce crime and the stereotype that Blacks are prone to violence varied across levels of White prejudice. There was a strong relationship between perceptions of African American violence and spending preferences among the more prejudiced Whites but no such relationship for the less prejudiced Whites. Relatedly, Nielsen et al. (2010) analyzed whether pejorative stereotypes predict whether individuals are more willing to spend money on drug rehabilitation. They analyzed data from the 1990 and 2000 GSS and found that stereotypes that depict African Americans and Hispanics as prone to violence did not predict attitudes toward spending more money on drug rehabilitation, while controlling for other factors (e.g., demographic and attitudinal variables).

More relevant, Welch et al. (2011) conducted a national telephone survey that allowed them to specifically test whether racial–ethnic pejorative typifications predicted punitive attitudes. They constructed an index composed of three questions that assessed the perceived percentage of Hispanic involvement (i.e., Hispanic criminal typification) in violent crime, burglary, and robbery (e.g., “When you think about people who rob other people at gunpoint, approximately what percent would you say are Hispanic?”) and a scale composed of eight questions that measured support for punitive crime control policies. Using a multilevel modeling strategy that included state-level measures (e.g., percentage born in Latin America), Welch et al. (2011) found that individuals who typify Hispanics as violent criminals (also those who typify African Americans) are more supportive of punitive policies, while controlling for a host of other covariates. Together, these studies are suggestive that among Whites, punitiveness is related to both general feelings of racial–ethnic animus and negative depictions of African Americans and Hispanics as being more violent. We explore these issues in the analysis to follow. As noted, we do so by using a white-centric approach to measuring stereotypes and by investigating how social context potentially conditions how racial and ethnic views are related to punitiveness.

Methods

Data

We analyze trend data from the GSS collected in 1990 and 2000. The GSS was conducted by the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) and is based on extensive personal interviews with adults, who were drawn from a probability sample of households in the continental United States (for additional details see Davis, Smith, and Marsden 1999). We chose these years because they are the only two years that data were collected on whether Whites perceive African Americans and Hispanics as more prone to violence than Whites. While we would have preferred our trend analysis to extend to more recent years, to our knowledge prior research has not investigated using national polling data whether racial and ethnic typifications of minorities as prone to violence change over time and whether these potential changes are related to support for the death penalty. Changes in this relationship could suggest that support for the death penalty may substantially diminish if Whites no longer perceive that minorities are prone to violence. We included only those who self-reported that they were White. Additionally, consistent with the prior research on racial–ethnic attitudes, all respondents who self-reported that they were neither White nor Black–that is, those who were classified as “other” on the GSS's RACE variable–were excluded from our analysis (Barkan and Cohn 2005; Henry and Sears 2009; Kinder and Sanders 1996; Peffley et al. 1997; Rabinowitz et al. 2009; Sears et al. 1997; Soss et al. 2003).²

Dependent Variable

We measure whether White Americans embrace punitive attitudes by assessing their support for capital punishment. Whites were asked whether they favor or oppose the death penalty for persons convicted of murder. The response categories included “favor,” “oppose,” and “don’t know”; 7.5 percent of the respondents answered “don’t know.” A dichotomous measure, Death Penalty (1 = favor, 0 = other), was constructed with those who answered “don’t know” coded 0. We use a dichotomous measure of support for the death penalty with caution, acknowledging that it may overestimate overall support. Research indicates that support for the death penalty decreases if individuals are offered other sentencing alternatives such as life without the possibility of parole (see, e.g., Unnever and Cullen 2005). It is noteworthy that other studies have used a binary measure of support for the death penalty, including Applegate et al. (2000), Stack (2000, 2003), and Unnever, Cullen, and Bartkowski (2006).

White-Centric Measures of Racial and Ethnic Stereotypes

Smith (2001:45) notes that in 1990 and again in 2000, the GSS made a concerted effort to include questions related to ethnic images that “(1) reduced the likelihood of giving offense, (2) facilitated the reporting of group characterizations, (3) permitted the expression of both positive and negative attributions, (4) allowed comparisons across various groups, and (5) included both in- and out-group evaluations of the reference groups.” To achieve these goals, the GSS included a set of questions that asked respondents to rate whether people in their self-designated group were mostly closer to one or the other of two polar statements (Smith 2001). We focus on one set of these questions: the polar opposites of “not violence prone” (coded 7) and “violence prone” (coded 1) that were included in the 1900 and 2000 datasets. More specifically, respondents were prompted with the question: “The next set asks if people in each group tend to be violence prone or if they tend not to be prone to violence?” Respondents were then asked to rate different groups as to how prone to violence they were from 1 to 7 (e.g., “Where would you rate whites in general on this scale?”). We analyze data from three questions: (1) Whites were asked to rate their own proneness to violence, (2) the proneness to violence for African Americans, and (3) their perception of the degree to which Hispanics are prone to violence.

We constructed two White-centric measures of race–ethnic stereotypes. First, we created Black Stereotype by taking the rating that Whites gave to African Americans and subtracting it from the score they gave to Whites. Higher values on Black Stereotype indicate that Whites perceived African Americans as more violent than members of their own race (the scores on the scale ranged from –4 to a +6). Second, we constructed Hispanic Stereotype by taking the rating that Whites gave to Hispanics and subtracting it from the score they gave to Whites. Higher values on Hispanic Stereotype indicated that Whites perceived Hispanics as more violent than members of their own race (the scores on the scale ranged from –5 to +6). These scales assess the relative degree to which Whites perceive African Americans and Hispanics as more violent than members of their own race.

Racial Prejudice

The GSS includes questions that are specifically related to being prejudiced against African Americans and Hispanics that are included in both 1990 and 2000. Respondents in both years were first prompted with the following question: “Now I’m going to ask you about different types of contact with various groups of people. In each situation would you please tell me whether you would be very much in favor of it happening, somewhat in favor, neither in favor nor opposed to it happening, somewhat opposed, or very much opposed to it happening?” The respondents were then prompted with the following two questions (MARBLK and MARHISP): “How about having a close relative or family member marry a black person?” And, “An Hispanic American person?” In addition, respondents in both years were asked how they felt about living in a neighborhood where half of their neighbors were African Americans (LIVBLKS) or half of their neighbors were Hispanics (LIVHSPS). We summed across the responses to these four questions to construct a scale, Racial–Ethnic Prejudice, that measures the degree to which Whites were prejudiced against African Americans and Hispanics. Its α coefficient was .816, and higher values on the scale indicate Whites were more racially and ethnically prejudiced. A factor analysis of these four items generated one factor. Finally, the inclusion of racial–ethnic prejudice is important because previous research indicates it is a strong predictor of support for the death penalty and because it allows us to isolate the potentially unique effects of racial and ethnic stereotypes about violence (see, e.g., Unnever et al. 2008).

Covariates

To limit the possibility of a misspecified analysis, we include, as controls, variables that are standard covariates (and predictors of) punitive attitudes (see Unnever and Cullen 2009b for a review of the relationships between support for the death penalty and these covariates). We controlled for gender (Male, 1 = male), Age (measured in years), and Education (number of years of formal education completed). Although equivocal, the research tends to show that males, people with less years of education, and those who are older are more supportive of capital punishment. To control for the respondent’s political ideology, we created a variable, Conservative, (scale of 1–7, with the maximum category denoting “extremely conservative” respondents) based on the following question. “We hear a lot of talk these days about liberals and conservatives. I’m going to show you a seven-point scale on which the political views that people might hold are arranged from extremely liberal—point 1—to extremely conservative—point 7. Where would you place yourself on this scale?” The research shows that political conservatives are strong supporters of the death penalty. We used the following question to control for the respondent’s self-reported social class, Social Class. “If you were asked to use one of four names for your social class, which would you say you belong in: the lower class (coded 1), the working class (coded 2), the middle class (coded 3), or the upper class? (coded 4).” We included a variable, Southerner (1 = southerner, 0 = others), that assessed whether respondents resided in the South when the interview was conducted. The research is equivocal as to whether social class predicts support whereas it generally indicates that southerners are slightly more likely to favor capital punishment.

In addition, we control for measures related to the respondent’s religious practices and beliefs in four ways: (1) We created a binary measure, Catholic (1 = Catholic, 0 = other), that assessed whether respondents self-reported a Catholic affiliation. (2) We used the classification scheme developed by Smith (1990) denoting whether respondents belonged to a fundamentalist denomination to construct our measure of whether individuals were affiliated with a Christian fundamentalist denomination, Fundamentalist (1 = fundamentalist denomination, 0 = other). (3) We constructed our measure of worship service attendance, Religious Attendance, based on the following question. “How often do you attend religious services?” The response categories ranged from (0) “never” to (7) “several times a week.” And, (4) we constructed a measure tapping strength of affiliation, Denominational Attachment, based on a question that asked respondents the degree to which they considered themselves to be a strong adherent to their faith tradition. The response categories ranged from “strong” to “no religion.” In general, extant studies reveal that religious beliefs and practices can both diminish (e.g., greater religious attendance) and enhance support for the death penalty (e.g., being a Christian fundamentalist).

Analytical Strategy

We use binary logistic regression because our dependent variable, support for capital punishment, is dichotomous. We analyze weighted samples (WTSSALL). We did not detect any indication of multicollinearity as ordinary least squares regression analyses indicated that the largest variance inflation factor (VIF) was 1.63. We report standardized logistic regression coefficients in the tables.

Results

Table 1 presents an analysis of whether our White-centric stereotypes of African Americans and Hispanics as being prone to violence predict support for the death penalty, while controlling for the other covariates. Note that in this analysis we have aggregated the two years, 1990 and 2000. We control for the year the data were collected with a binary variable, Year2000, with the year 2000 coded 1 and 1990 coded 0.

Table 1.

The Relationship between Support for the Death Penalty and Racial–Ethnic Stereotypes for the Years 1990 and 2000

Variables	Model 1	Model 2	Model 3
Black stereotype	.065*	–	.122**
Hispanic stereotype	–	.070*	–
Racial–ethnic prejudice	.198***	.203***	.202***
Male	.137***	.137***	.140***
Age	–.080**	–.075*	–.082**
Education	–.064	–.080*	–.067
Conservative	.157***	.158***	.159***
Social class	–.050	–.051	–.048
Southerner	–.038	–.030	–.038
Catholic	–.004	–.010	–.005
Fundamentalist	.034	.037	.034
Religious attendance	–.100**	–.101**	–.096**
Denominational attachment	–.055	–.055	–.056
Year2000	–.068*	–.064	–.033
Year2000 × Black stereotype	–	–	–.090*
N	1,763	1,719	1,763
Max-rescaled R ²	.118***	.123***	.121***

****p < .001.

**p < .01.

*p < .05 (two-tailed tests).

The results from Model 1 of Table 1 indicate that Whites that embrace the negative stereotype that African Americans are more prone to violence than members of their own race are significantly more likely to support capital punishment, while controlling for the other covariates. Similarly, the results from Model 2 of Table 1 indicate that the White-centric Hispanic pejorative stereotype also significantly predicts greater support for capital punishment, while controlling for the other covariates.

Consistent with the prior research, the results also reveal that the most prominent predictor of support for the death penalty is our index of racial–ethnic prejudice (Bobo and Johnson 2004; Johnson 2008; Soss et al. 2003; Unnever and Cullen 2007b). In addition, the results show that males and political conservatives are more likely, while those that are older and those who attend church more often are less likely to support capital punishment. Of note, the direction of the binary coded year variable (Year2000) indicates that Whites were less likely to support capital punishment in 2000 than in 1990.

Model 3 of Table 1 tests whether the relationship between support for the death penalty and the White negative stereotype of African Americans as being prone to violence varies across the two years. The results reveal that the interaction term Black Stereotype × Year2000 is significant. The significant interaction term indicates that the influence of the negative stereotype of African Americans as being prone to violence on support for capital punishment varies across the two years. Based on this finding, we reanalyze the data separately for each year.

Before doing so, we examine whether White stereotypes of African Americans and Hispanics as being prone to violence have changed over time. We also investigate whether Whites have embraced a more progressive attitude toward interracial marriage and the degree to which support for the death penalty has changed over time.

In Table 2, we present the bivariate correlations between these variables with our time measure, Year2000. Consistent with the prior research (Everts et al. 2005; Thornton and Young-DeMarco 2001), the bivariate correlations show an unequivocally clear pattern; that is, White racial attitudes have become more progressive from 1990 to 2000. The results from Table 2 reveal that Whites were more likely in 2000 than in 1990 to rate African Americans and Hispanics as relatively less violent than members of their own race. The results also indicate that the greatest change occurred in our general index measure of racial–ethnic prejudice; that is, White attitudes toward interracial–interethnic marriage and racial and ethnic residential segregation. The correlations further indicate that White support for capital punishment significantly declined from 1990 to 2000.

Table 2.

Bivariate Correlations that Assess Whether Attitudes Have Changed from 1990 to 2000 (year2000; 1 = year 2000, 0 = year 1990)

Variable	Year 2000
Black stereotype	–.108***
Hispanic stereotype	–.101***
Racial–ethnic prejudice	–.345***
Support for the death penalty	–.096***

***p < .001.

**p < .01.

*p < .05 (two-tailed tests).

In Table 3 we separately report for the years 1990 and 2000 the frequencies for how Whites evaluate their proneness to violence in comparison to their evaluations of African Americans and Hispanics. In 1990, the data show that Whites reported that African Americans were 15 times more likely to be very prone (category 1) and Hispanics were 7 times more likely to be very prone to violence than members of their own race. In 2000, Whites believed that African Americans were 4.5 times more likely and Hispanics were 2 times more likely to be very prone to violence than Whites.

Table 3.

Percentages for White Perceptions of Proneness to Violence for the Years 1990 and 2000

Prone to Violence	1990			2000
Prone to Violence	Whites	African Americans	Hispanics	Whites	African Americans	Hispanics
1 Prone	.55	8.50	4.05	1.14	5.23	2.59
2	3.59	17.65	13.98	3.98	14.07	9.25
3	12.42	27.54	24.49	13.16	28.14	25.47
4	44.71	30.13	37.70	50.09	37.55	45.07
5	17.39	9.33	12.54	17.71	8.56	11.24
6	16.56	5.08	5.50	11.17	4.85	4.88
7 Not prone	4.78	1.76	1.74	2.75	1.62	1.49

In addition, the data indicate a 39 percent decline in the percentage of Whites who rated African Americans as very prone to violence; this categorical evaluation declined from 8.50 percent in 1990 to 5.23 percent in 2000. Table 3 indicates a 21 percent decline for the second highest evaluation; it declined from 17.65 percent in 1990 to 14.07 in 2000. There also was a substantial decline in how Whites evaluated the proneness toward violence for Hispanics. The data indicate a 37 percent decline in the percentage of Whites who rated Hispanics as very prone to violence; this categorical evaluation declined from 4.05 percent in 1990 to 2.59 percent in 2000. Table 3 indicates a 34 percent decline for the second highest evaluation of Hispanics; it declined from 13.98 percent in 1990 to 9.25 in 2000. Thus, these frequencies reveal a substantial decrease in White perceptions of the proneness for violence for both African Americans and Hispanics from 1990 to 2000 both in absolute and in relative terms.

Table 4 presents an analysis of whether support for capital punishment is related to White negative stereotypes of African Americans and Hispanics in 1990 and 2000. Models 1 and 2 present the results for 1990 and Models 3 and 4 present the results for 2000. The results from Models 1 and 2 show that Whites who believed that African Americans and Hispanics (one-tail test of significance, p = .04) were more violent than members of their own race were more likely to support the death penalty. Of note, the standardized logistic regression coefficients indicate that our measure of racial–ethnic prejudice was the most substantive predictor of support for capital punishment in 1990.

Table 4.

Regression Analysis of Whether Support for the Death Penalty is Related to White Negative Stereotypes of African Americans and Hispanics in 1990 and 2000

Variables	1990		2000
Variables	Model 1	Model 2	Model 3	Model 4
Black stereotype	.125**	–	–.008	–
Hispanic stereotype	–	.087****	–	.050
Racial–ethnic prejudice	.207***	.208***	.180***	.180***
Male	.113**	.111*	.167***	.166***
Age	–.050	–.046	–.114**	–.106*
Education	–.095	–.117*	–.041	–.049
Conservative	.161***	.163***	.161***	.154***
Social class	–.038	–.042	–.063	–.062
Southerner	–.075	–.070	–.007	.002
Catholic	.025	.021	–.032	–.037
Fundamentalist	.022	.018	.052	.061
Religious attendance	–.004	–.015	–.186***	–.184***
Denominational attach.	.045	.038	–.154**	–.147**
N	944	916	819	803
Max-rescaled R ²	.110***	.108***	.120***	.126***

***p < .001.

**p < .01.

*p < .05 (two-tailed tests).

****p = .04 (one-tailed test).

Models 3 and 4 of Table 4 indicate that in 2000 White negative typifications of African Americans and Hispanics as being prone to violence did not significantly predict support for the death penalty. It is noteworthy that even though the pejorative racial and ethnic stereotypes no longer predicted greater support for capital punishment, our measure of racial–ethnic prejudice in 2000 was one of the most substantive correlates of support for the death penalty.

Finally, we tested whether support for capital punishment was most prominent among Whites who endorsed negative stereotypes of African Americans and Hispanics and professed more general racial–ethnic animus. Thus, for example, we examined whether the interaction term Racial–Ethnic Prejudice × Black Stereotype significantly predicted support for the death penalty by year. These analyses indicated that one of the interaction terms was statistically significant for 1990; the Racial–Ethnic Prejudice × Black Stereotype measure (–.504, p = .05). To more fully understand this significant interaction term, we divided our sample at the mean for the racial–ethnic prejudice index and reestimated the regression equation for the year 1990. These results indicate that the relationship between believing that African Americans are prone to violence and support for the death penalty was greater among the most racially–ethnically prejudiced Whites.

Discussion

The Changing Dynamic of Racial and Ethnic Stereotypes

The late 1980s and early 1990s was a unique period of time in American history. The “war on drugs” was fully engaged (Bobo and Thompson 2006), and the “crack epidemic” that further eroded already disadvantaged neighborhoods was at its peak. The collateral damage of these dual forces was a record-breaking volume of Black-on-Black violent crime, especially juvenile murders. In fact, non-White juvenile arrests for murder from 1985 to 1992 increased 120 percent (Mencken, Nolan, and Berhanu 2004). And, the data indicate that African American teenagers in the late 1980s were three to five times more likely than White youths to be murder victims. Additionally, the homicide rate for 12- to 15-year-old African American males was five times the rate of Whites (U.S. Department of Justice 1991).

However, by 2000, the crack epidemic had subsided along with the “playing the race card”—as represented most poignantly by the “Willie Horton” harsh politics of the late 1980s (Culverson 2006; Hurwitz and Peffley 2005; Mendelberg 1997; Newburn and Jones 2005). These changes ushered in a precipitous decline in crime (see also Blumstein and Wallman 2000; Conklin 2003). Indeed, Zimring (2006) documents that since World War II, the largest and deepest decline in crime occurred during the 1990s. This decrease cut across race and ethnic groups; for example, the Hispanic homicide rate declined 43 percent from 1990 to 1998 (Martinez and Valenzuela 2006). Indeed, at the beginning of the twenty-first century, the United States was experiencing its lowest ever recorded rate of violent crime.

These changes are reflected in public opinion polling data. Take, for example, a trend analysis of Gallup poll data from 1972 to 2008 on whether respondents felt that there was more crime in their area than a year ago. During this period, the lowest percentage (26 percent) occurred in 2001; in 1990, the figure was 51 percent (Gallup’s Pulse of Democracy, Crime 2009). Similarly, an analysis of the American National Election Study (ANES) data from 1960 to 2000 shows that the largest percentage of people rating “public order” as their number one concern occurred in 1994 (38.5 percent); by 2000 this number declined to 22.9 percent.

Paralleling these changes, our trend data indicate that the degree to which Whites believed that African Americans and Hispanics were more violent than themselves declined 340 percent from 1990 to 2000. In 1990, Whites considered African Americans 15 times more likely to be violent than members of their own race and by 2000 Whites thought Blacks were 5 times more violent than Whites. The decline in the relative perception of Hispanic violence was not as great but it was substantial–a 250 percent decline. In 1990, Whites believed that Hispanics were five times more likely than members of their own race to be very prone to violence and by 2000 they considered Hispanics as twice as violent as Whites. In addition, the absolute frequencies replicate this downward trend especially in the “very prone” to violence category for both African Americans and Hispanics. The data indicate a 39 percent decline in the percentage of Whites who rated African Americans as very prone to violence and a 37 percent decline in the percentage of Whites who rated Hispanics as very prone to violence. Yet, it is instructive that in both 1990 and 2000, approximately twice as many respondents rated African Americans and Hispanics at the highest level of violence proneness. It is noteworthy that these trend changes parallel those in other domains of race relations as our data indicate that generalized racial and ethnic prejudice also declined from 1990 to 2000, at least as measured by attitudes toward interracial–interethnic marriage and racial and ethnic residential segregation.

Racial and Ethnic Stereotypes and Support for the Death Penalty

As previously stated, prior studies unequivocally indicate that White support for the death penalty is increased by racial–ethnic animus. However, the data show that Americans have become more “progressive” both in their race–ethnic-related attitudes and, to a lesser extent, in their support for capital punishment. Therefore, the question remains as to whether these shifts in attitudes have shaped the relationship between White support for the death penalty and pejorative typifications of African Americans and Hispanics as prone to violent and their more generally held racial–ethnic prejudices. Our analysis reveals that in 1990, Whites who perceived African Americans and Hispanics as more violent than members of their own race were substantially more likely to support capital punishment. Yet, by 2000, this relationship was no longer significant. We argue that these results suggest that Whites contextualize both their negative stereotypes of African Americans and Hispanics and their support for the death penalty.

Thus, we contend that the decline in the relationship from 1990 to 2000 between White racial–ethnic pejorative typifications and support for capital punishment is related to whether they perceive minority violence to be within the parameters of their relative prejudiced perception of African American and Hispanic violence (López 2003). We argue that Whites will be less likely to demand support for the death penalty if their relative perception of African Americans and Hispanic violence is within what they consider to be “tolerable limits.” In other words, Whites will only demand “that something be done” when their perception of how violent African Americans and Hispanics are exceeding their prejudiced understanding of their own and minority violence. In short, Whites are particularly threatened by African Americans and Hispanic violence when they perceive it is “getting out of control” in relation to members of their own race and their normative expectations of minority violence. Accordingly, we found that in 1990, when minority-related crime was being socially constructed as a serious social problem, both racial–ethnic prejudice and a negative depiction of African Americans and Hispanics being prone to violence predicted support for the death penalty.

In a way, these results suggest a degree of optimism. As social conditions changed, White attitudes changed with them—at least to a degree. Most important, relative views of African Americans' violence proneness lost their close connection to policy preferences, with such beliefs no longer inspiring support for capital punishment. This insight is important because it shows that racial–ethnic toxic typifications and their impact on punitiveness are social products, malleable to some extent, and thus potential targets for change. It also leaves open the possibility that negative depictions of minority groups may further decline. It is feasible that with the election of the first African American President of the United States, Barack Obama, the “Obama effect” may dilute the perception that Blacks and Hispanics are more prone to violence than the average White (Plant et al. 2009; Unnever, Gabbidon, and Higgins 2011).

But a bleaker underside to this observation exists. In both 1990 and 2000—that is, regardless of context—Whites harboring racial–ethnic prejudice were more likely to favor the use of the death penalty. Thus, it appears that racial–ethnic animus as a source of punitiveness is a more stable relationship that may endure into the foreseeable future. Notably, the impact of the dislike of minorities on punitiveness has been demonstrated to exist across Western nations, and thus may function as a cultural universal in societies with conflicted racial–ethnic relations that are difficult to uproot (Unnever and Cullen 2010b).

Two implications flow from these observations. First, our findings further reinforce the conclusion that punitiveness, including death penalty support, in the United States has a core racial–ethnic component (see also Tonry 2011). Analyses of support for harsh correctional policies that ignore race–ethnicity are thus likely to be misspecified. Second, our findings also show that racial and ethnic views do not constitute a homogenous set of beliefs with the same or consistent effects on the public’s support for getting tough on criminals. We have focused on two such beliefs—stereotypes of proneness to violence and racial and ethnic prejudice—and demonstrated their differential effects on support for capital punishment. Future research needs to further unpack racial and ethnic beliefs into finer components, examine their effects across context, and develop a more sophisticated theory of the racial–ethnic sources of the desire to punish (see Unnever and Cullen 2009a).³

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

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