Research finds that individuals of dark complexions are more likely to face prejudice or be discriminated against in a variety of contexts. Referred to as colorism, skin-tone-based discrimination has major implications for various life outcomes. Research on social interactions suggests that lighter skin tones are associated with a higher level of physical attractiveness, which is of particular interest for this study. This study uses quantitative survey data collected from undergraduate and graduate students from across the United States to explore the relationship between colorism, gender, and perceived physical attraction via a modified version of Harvey, Tennial, and Bank’s In-Group Colorism Scale (ICS). Analyses measured the relationship between a participant’s own skin tone, which was self-assessed via comparison to images modeled after make-up swatches, and results on a subscale of the ICS which measures attraction to lighter skin tones. Our results suggest that gender has a significant impact on perceived physical attractiveness, with male-identifying participants placing more weight on the significance of skin tone when determining physical attraction. Implications for future research and translational implications are also discussed.

Immigrants to the United States are assigned to ethnic and racial categories that often make little sense in an international context or are actively resisted by new arrivals. This study uses a large, nationally representative sample to test how skin color constrains and patterns that resistance, and how individual characteristics shape identification choices. Using the 2003 New Immigrant Survey, I find that skin tone has significant relationships with ethnic and racial self-identification choices for immigrants, even after controlling for characteristics like country of origin, with higher rates of Latinx identification among light-skinned immigrants than dark-skinned respondents, and especially high rates of refusing the “standard” racial categories for those near the middle of the skin tone scale. The racial categories selected by immigrants reflect not only their region of origin, but also their education level and their age, controlling for a range of demographic predictors. I discuss the implications for the racialization of immigrants to the United States.

Research on candidate evaluation has delved into questions of how voters evaluate women candidates, Black male candidates, as well as how candidates’ appearances may condition electoral opportunities. Combined, this scholarship has tended to focus on how race, gender, and skin tone privilege or undermine evaluations of Black male or White women candidates. We intervene to study Black women candidates and draw on research on colorism and Black women's hairstyles and ask: How does variation in skin tone and hairstyle affect Black voter evaluations of Black women candidates? We develop and test two hypotheses: the empowerment hypothesis and the internal discrimination hypothesis. We mostly find support for the latter. Importantly, we find that the interaction of dark skin and non-straight hair has mostly negative effects on Black men and women's trait evaluations, but a positive effect on Black women's willingness to vote for the candidate. Furthermore, this research shows that hair texture is an important aspect of responses to Black women candidates—hair is not just hair for Black women candidates. This research shows that understanding the effects of candidate appearance on voter behavior necessitates considering the intersection of racial and gender phenotypes.

Employing a comparative experimental design drawing on over 18,000 interviews across eleven countries on four continents, this article revisits the discussion about the economic and cultural drivers of attitudes towards immigrants in advanced democracies. Experiments manipulate the occupational status, skin tone and national origin of immigrants in short vignettes. The results are most consistent with a Sociotropic Economic Threat thesis: In all countries, higher-skilled immigrants are preferred to their lower-skilled counterparts at all levels of native socio-economic status (SES). There is little support for the Labor Market Competition hypothesis, since respondents are not more opposed to immigrants in their own SES stratum. While skin tone itself has little effect in any country, immigrants from Muslim-majority countries do elicit significantly lower levels of support, and racial animus remains a powerful force.