> Dupree and Fiske suspect that the behavior stems from a liberal person’s desire to connect with other races. One possible reason for the “competence downshift,” as the authors describe it, is that, regardless of race, people tend to downplay their competence when they want to appear likeable and friendly. But it’s also possible that “this is happening because people are using common stereotypes in an effort to get along,” Dupree says.

And? Does this strategy work for them? If so, maybe it's not a bad thing.

I do this around most people unless I need to signal superiority, otherwise I view broadcasting competency where none is needed as a pissing context. I assume everyone is highly skilled in at least one thing.

I wonder how people's choice of diction compares with a personal diary entry vs. the experimental groups in question.

https://psyarxiv.com/pv2ab/

> The word “sad,” for example, scored low for both warmth and competence. “Melancholy,” on the other hand, scored high for competence and low on warmth.

Why can’t “sad” be used in a “warm” context?

White liberals are racist too? Gosh, it's almost as if this was a systemic problem

I wonder if so many of the supposed racist dogwhistles are entirely within and repressed within the heads of guilty white liberals. If you look at what people do, rather than what they profess, the disconnection can be very jarring.

I get the impression that this study is flawed. The conclusion could have been something like, intelligent people dumbed down their speech when talking to someone they perceived as intellectually inferior to them. I'd like to see the same study repeats with white conservatives intellectuals and rednecks. That'd probably ended up with the same conclusion.