The Perpetuation of Segregation Across Levels of Education: A Behavioral Assessment of the Contact Hypothesis

  • High school racial composition has large, direct effect on attending a PWI.
  • Only college cost and HS GPA have larger direct effects.
  • HS racial composition is slightly reduced by the indirect effect of GPA (0.01).
  • SES is related to HS racial make-up (% white) but the effect is substantial, net of SES.
  • Gender is related to GPA, but HS racial comp, has a larger direct effect than gender.
  • Findings support the idea that desegregation practices can interrupt the perpetuation of racial segregation.
  • One of the largest (.23) direct effects on attendance at a predominantly White college. Only high school grades (.24) and college costs (-.27) show larger effects.
  • The net or direct effect of desegregation practice found for this sample of Black students is substantial, independent of self-selection into high school due to SES, and other mediating influences in the model.
  • High school racial composition exhibits a larger direct and total nonspurious effect than sex-the other potential self-selection biasing factor.