A Racialized Engine of Anxiety? Race, Reactivity, and the Uneven Tax of Credit Scores
通过访谈和全国调查，研究发现信用评分对黑人和白人产生不同的心理和行为影响，黑人群体承受更高的焦虑和负担，揭示了信用评分作为种族化焦虑引擎的机制。
Research demonstrates that evaluations made via scores often induce anxiety and alter the behaviors of those being evaluated. Research further suggests that this so-called reactivity is not experienced equally. Yet, scholars do not fully understand what explains this variation. For whom does being scored induce reactivity and why ? Drawing on insights from W.E.B. Du Bois and Frantz Fanon, I argue that the experience of being scored differs across racial groups. I evaluate this claim by using a mixed-methods approach that combines interviews and an original national survey on consumer credit scoring. The interviews demonstrate that Black respondents’ credit scores exact a psychological and behavioral tax as the respondents indicate higher levels of anxiety and feeling that their score is a controlling factor in their lives. In contrast, White respondents recognize the importance of their credit scores for determining access to resources but do not see their scores as more significant beyond that. Survey analyses generalize these findings, showing substantial disparities in reactivity to credit scores between Black and White respondents even after the analyses account for economic factors like differences in their credit scores. These findings reveal credit scores as racialized engines of anxiety and yield new insight into the mechanisms that condition whether and to what extent being scored shapes behaviors.