The Anticipated Relational Effects of Confronting Bias (or not) in Interracial Friendships

Abstract

Most biased comments people experience are from friends. However, little is known about how people process experiences in which a friend expresses bias and how the relationship might be affected. The current research examines the anticipated relational effects of confronting (vs. not confronting) a friend’s bias, using adult participants in the United States. Asian participants who imagined confronting a White friend’s biased comment (or a stranger’s: see Study 1) anticipated higher friendship or relationship quality compared with those who imagined not having that confrontation. This effect remained regardless of whether bias was directed toward participants’ in-group or toward an out-group (see Study 2). The closer people felt to their friend, the more confronting (vs. not confronting) elicited higher friendship quality. Experimentally testing for mechanism demonstrated that the effect of confronting is driven by greater anticipated understanding (see Study 3). This work reveals that Asian people expect that confronting a friend’s bias will elicit greater understanding and buffer against negative interpersonal effects.

Statement of Relevance

The majority of biased comments people hear are from friends (Dickter & Newton, 2013), and 40% of Americans report confronting a friend or family member for a biased comment (Horowitz et al., 2019). Yet, how people think about confronting a friend (or not) is unknown. Relationship quality can be improved by mutual understanding (Reis et al., 2017), and confronting can provide an opportunity to express oneself and establish understanding with close others. Further, a proposed starting point for healing racial division is to start a conversation and talk to one’s friends (Song, 2019). Thus, it is essential to understand how racial minorities expect their interracial relationships to be impacted when they confront others about bias. Ultimately, our research helps explain why minority-group members might choose to confront bias from a close friend—namely, that they expect it to be less detrimental for their friendship than to stay silent.

Keywords

confronting bias interracial friendships intergroup relations conversations friendship quality discrimination intergroup interactions race-related discussions

Introduction

Although close friends often withhold speech to promote interpersonal harmony (DePaulo & Kashy, 1998; Ennis et al., 2008), over 40% of Americans report having confronted friends or family members who made racially discriminatory comments (Horowitz et al., 2019). For those with egalitarian values, calls to address racial injustice by confronting one’s friends (see Kendi, 2019) may create conflict between a desire for relational harmony and a desire to express one’s values. The present research examines this tension within interracial friendships from the racial minority perspective.

Confronting bias involves expressing dissatisfaction to someone responsible for prejudicial or discriminatory treatment. Research on confronting bias largely examines the predictors of confrontations (e.g., Rattan & Dweck, 2010; Shelton et al., 2005), effectiveness of confrontations in reducing bias (e.g., Czopp et al., 2006; Gulker et al., 2013), and evaluations of the confronter (e.g., Kaiser & Miller, 2001, 2003). However, the research primarily considers confronting strangers’ bias, whereas most biased comments come from friends (Dickter & Newton, 2013).

The burgeoning literature on confronting friends focuses on witnesses’ intentions to confront when they are not the target of discrimination and perpetrators’ responses to confrontation. Witnesses of discrimination report greater intentions to confront friends than strangers (Moisuc & Brauer, 2019) because they believe they will be more effective confronters with a friend and because they believe they are more likely to change a friend’s behavior than that of a stranger (Brown et al., 2021). Conversely, perpetrators report less negative perceptions of a confronter who is a friend than a stranger because of greater trust (Hildebrand et al., 2023). What remains unknown is how these experiences might affect the relationship between two friends (although see Rattan & Dweck, 2018, for an assessment of workplace relationships). The present work investigates how anticipating confronting (vs. not confronting) affects a racial minority group target’s anticipated relationship quality with a perpetrator.

Confrontations can elicit negative reactions, such as perpetrators’ reported animosity toward a confronting stranger (Czopp & Monteith, 2003). Minority-group confronters are often perceived as “complainers” and “troublemakers” by White witnesses (Kaiser & Miller, 2001, 2003). The confronting-prejudice model (Ashburn-Nardo et al., 2008) posits that people perceive interpersonal confrontation as a relational threat. Thus, when targets of discrimination are deciding whether or not to confront a friend, they may be particularly concerned with the perpetrator’s view of them (Eggleston et al., 2015; Schultz & Maddox, 2013), which may yield concerns that confronting will worsen their relationship. Although no work has examined the effects of anticipating confronting friends, some research has suggested that relational concerns could lead minority-group members to anticipate diminished friendship quality when imagining confronting a friend (vs. not confronting).

When targets of prejudice reflect on a time when they believe they should have confronted a stranger but did not, they report less positive emotions (e.g., optimism) and more negative emotions (e.g., guilt; Shelton et al., 2005) than those who considered a time when they chose to confront. Regardless of one’s response to bias, experiencing discrimination from a friend negatively affects one’s relationship (Swim et al., 2003). Still, open dialogue grants friends the opportunity to communicate about their concerns and needs (Finkenauer & Buyukcan-Tetik, 2015). We suggest that confronting a friend may create a buffer against reduced relationship quality by allowing the confronter to share experiences and values—components essential for mutual understanding (Coombs, 1966; Reis & Shaver, 1988). Likewise, self-disclosure and well-received conversations between interracial friends can foster closeness (Page-Gould et al., 2008; Shelton et al., 2010). If a confrontation between interracial friends leads to self-disclosure and a well-received interaction, then confrontations could similarly foster closeness.

Thus, confronting could be seen as an avenue to improve understanding—an integral component of relationship quality (Reis et al., 2017). For example, White and Black people report greater relationship quality with racial out-group members when they feel understood (Holoien et al., 2015). In romantic relationships, perceptions of understanding during a conflict predict relationship satisfaction (Hinnekens et al., 2020), and the negative effects of interpersonal conflict on relationship quality can be buffered by feeling understood by one’s partner (Gordon & Chen, 2016). We posit that imagining confronting (vs. not confronting) a friend’s bias may elicit similar effects among targets of bias—that is, anticipated understanding will buffer against potential negative effects of confrontation on friendship quality.

Overview of research

Across four experiments (and a supplemental experiment), we investigated how minority-group members expected confronting (vs. not confronting) a friend about a biased comment would impact their interracial friendship. Asian participants imagined confronting (vs. not confronting) a close White friend’s biased remarks (Study 1: a stranger’s biased remarks) and reported on how they anticipated this interaction would influence the quality of their relationship or friendship. We also tested a proposed mechanism—anticipated understanding—both correlationally (Study 1 and Study 2) and causally through experimental design (Study 3).

Research transparency statement

Deidentified data, scripts, and output for all studies are publicly accessible at https://osf.io/t3vyg/?view_only=d7a5dcd375b34038ae3d33b1f59c67b5. The preregistrations can be accessed as follows: Study 1, at https://aspredicted.org/K2M_WTT); Study 2a, at https://aspredicted.org/blind.php?x=83P_DSZ); Study 2b, at https://aspredicted.org/VFM_8KR); and Study 3, at https://aspredicted.org/blind.php?x=8X6_1DS. The materials used in these studies and in Supplemental Study S1 (not preregistered) are publicly accessible in the Supplemental Material available online.

Study 1

In Study 1, we examined Asian participants’ anticipated relationship quality after considering confronting (vs. not confronting) an anti-Asian biased comment. We also assessed whether the effects of confronting (vs. not confronting) on relationship quality varied depending on one’s closeness to the perpetrator (i.e., whether the perpetrator was a friend or a stranger). We predicted that participants who imagined confronting (vs. not) would report higher relationship quality, and that this effect would be greater for friends (vs. strangers). Additionally, we correlationally tested for a mediating role of anticipated understanding.

Method

Participants

Study 1 (preregistered) included 524 Asian American CloudResearch participants. Because of a data-collection error, only a subset of participants were asked demographic questions (n = 159; 60% women, 40% men; M_age = 35.12 years, SD_age = 15.85). We sought to collect data from at least 538 participants, but ended data collection after waiting 3 months for new sign-ups. This sample is sufficient to detect a small-to-medium effect size ( f = .14, which translates to η² = .02; 90% power). See the Supplemental Material available online for exclusions and additional sample demographic information for all studies.

Procedure

After informed consent, participants were asked to name and describe their closest White friend or imagine that they met a gender-unspecified White stranger named Jamie. Participants were randomly assigned to write about confronting or not confronting the perpetrator, and they completed questionnaires about their anticipated relationship quality and anticipated understanding. Consistent with our preregistration, participants also reported their anticipated emotions and self-views (see the Supplemental Material for full reporting). We also tested exploratory outcome variables in Study 1 and Study 2 (e.g., perceived as a complainer; see the Supplemental Material). Last, participants completed a manipulation check, provided demographic information, and were debriefed. See the Supplemental Material for materials and measures for all studies. All studies were approved by the New York University Institutional Review Board to ensure protection of participants.

Materials and measures

Confrontation and closeness manipulations

In the friend condition, participants read the following vignette: “You and (friend’s name) are hanging out after math class. (Friend’s name) makes a comment about how your classmates are good at math, but would have a hard time if it were an English class, because they are Asian.” The biased comment included both positive stereotypes about math (e.g., Siy & Cheryan, 2016) and negative foreignness stereotypes (e.g., Zou & Cheryan, 2017), to keep the superficial valence of the comment balanced. Participants in the stranger condition read the same vignette, but the perpetrator was described as someone they had just met named Jaime (gender not specified). Next, participants were assigned to imagine either confronting or not confronting their friend (or the stranger). Finally, participants wrote about what would happen after confronting (or not confronting).

Anticipated relationship quality and understanding

Participants reported their anticipated relationship quality (adapted from Hendrick, 1988; Shelton et al., 2005; 6 items; e.g., 1 = very unsatisfied, 7 = very satisfied; a = .96). Participants also reported anticipated understanding (adapted from Holoien et al., 2015; 8 items; 1 = not at all, 7 = very much; a = .92) that assessed how much participants felt the friend (or the stranger) would understand them. For full measures and manipulations, see the Supplemental Material.

Results

See Table 1 for descriptive statistics and the Supplemental Material for correlations among variables.

Table 1.

Study 1: Descriptive Statistics by Manipulation for Anticipated Variables

Variable	Confronting condition		Not confronting condition
	Friend (n = 119)	Stranger (n = 141)	Friend (n = 129)	Stranger (n = 135)
	M (SD)	M (SD)	M (SD)	M (SD)
Relationship quality	3.75^a (1.59)	2.77^b (1.33)	3.19^b (1.39)	2.34^c (1.09)
Understanding	4.11^a (1.49)	3.05^b (1.43)	3.11^b (1.49)	2.27^c (1.23)

Note: Different superscripts within a row indicate statistically significant (p < .05) differences as computed using planned contrasts of raw means without corrections.

We conducted 2 (confrontation: confronting, not confronting) × 2 (closeness: friend, stranger) between-subjects analyses of variance (ANOVAs) on the participants’ anticipated relationship quality and understanding. A main effect of confronting emerged: Asian participants who imagined confronting reported higher relationship quality (see Fig. 1), F(1, 520) = 15.40, p < .001, η_p² = .03, 90% confidence interval (CI) = [.01, .06], and understanding, F(1, 520) = 57.88, p < .001, η_p² = .08, 90% CI = [.05, .12], than those who imagined not confronting. A main effect of closeness condition emerged as well: Asian participants who imagined interacting with a friend reported higher relationship quality, F(1, 520) = 59.48, p < .001, η_p² = .10, 90% CI = [.07, .15], and understanding, F(1, 520) = 59.50, p < .001, η_p² = .10, 90% CI = [.07, .15], than those who imagined interacting with a stranger. Contrary to our preregistered prediction, no interaction emerged for relationship quality, F(1, 520) = 0.26, p = .614, nor understanding, F(1, 520) = 0.84, p = .361.

We next conducted mediation analyses with 5,000 bootstrap samples to assess whether the confrontation manipulation (confronting, not confronting) affected anticipated relationship quality through anticipated understanding, adjusting for closeness condition and the Confrontation × Closeness interaction term (see Table 2 for coefficients; Hayes, 2017). The assessment of joint significance (Yzerbyt et al., 2018) revealed that understanding significantly mediated the effect of confronting (vs. not confronting) on relationship quality (see Table 2). We also ran an additional study in which participants imagined confronting (vs. not confronting) a friend and found the same ANOVA and mediation results for the effects of confronting; however, we did not include it in the main text because it is an unpreregistered simplified version of Study 1 and Study 2 (see Supplemental Study 1 in the Supplemental Material).

Table 2.

Study 1: Anticipated Understanding Mediation on Anticipated Relationship Quality

Coefficient	Descriptive label	Relationship quality
a	Confrontation → Understanding	.89*** (.12)
b	Understanding → Relationship Quality	.62*** (.03)
c	Total effect	.50*** (.12)
c′	Direct effect	−.05 (.10)
95% CI, indirect effect	Indirect effect	.55 [.38, .72]

Note: Path coefficients, standard errors (in parentheses), and percentile bootstrap confidence intervals (CIs) around the indirect effect are reported. Confrontation condition was coded as −.5 (not confronting) or .5 (confronting), and closeness condition was coded as −.5 (stranger) or .5 (friend). Model included closeness and the Confrontation × Closeness interaction term as covariates. Path coefficients are as follows: a denotes the effect of confrontation condition on anticipated understanding; b denotes the effect of anticipated understanding on anticipated relationship quality; c denotes the total effect of confrontation manipulation on relationship quality; and c′ denotes the direct effect of confrontation manipulation on relationship quality. The indirect effect of paths a and b are also reported. Joint-significance assessment of paths a and b indicated there is joint significance.

***

p < .001.

Discussion

In Study 1, Asian participants imagining confronting (vs. not confronting) a White perpetrator’s biased comment anticipated higher relationship quality and more understanding. An examination of the means suggests that the act of confronting buffers against the typical negative relational impact that not confronting a biased comment is assumed to have. Only those imagining confronting a friend reported friendship quality ratings at or above the neutral midpoint, indicating participants did not anticipate a negative impact on relationship quality when imagining confronting a friend. Mediation analyses revealed that feeling understood, in part, drives the effect of confronting on relationship quality. Given the limited research on confronting friends and our focus on relational effects, subsequent studies focus on this context.

Study 2

We replicated and extended Study 1 by examining the effects of imagining confronting a friend’s bias directed toward the in-group compared with an out-group. Confronting a friend’s in-group-relevant (vs. out-group-relevant) bias may provide a stronger buffer against reduced friendship quality because it involves sharing information central to one’s identity (Reis & Shaver, 1988). We predicted that participants would anticipate higher friendship quality if they imagined confronting (vs. not confronting) and that this effect would be enhanced when considering in-group-relevant (vs. out-group-relevant) bias. Again, we tested whether anticipated understanding mediated the effect. We also explored whether people who felt closer to their friends anticipated especially higher friendship quality after confronting (vs. not confronting).

Method

Participants

In Study 2a (preregistered), 178 Asian American undergraduate students (114 women, M_age = 19.24, SD_age = 1.14) completed an online survey for partial course credit. We intended to collect 360 participants, but we concluded after online data collection had taken a full academic year; this sample is sufficient to detect a medium effect size ( f = .21, which translates to η² = .04; 80% power). Because we sought to test for a potential attenuated interaction, we conducted a direct replication (Study 2b; preregistered), with 880 Asian American Prolific participants (455 women, M_age = 27.63, SD_age = 7.99). Study 2b is sensitive to detect a small effect size ( f = .09, which translates to η² = .01; 80% power).

Procedure

After informed consent, participants were asked to name and report on their closeness to their closest White friend. Participants then imagined that this friend made a biased comment (group-relevance manipulation: in-group-relevant, out-group-relevant). Participants were randomly assigned to imagine confronting or not confronting their friend, and they reported their anticipated friendship quality and anticipated understanding. Consistent with our preregistration, participants also reported their anticipated emotions and self-views (see the Supplemental Material for full reporting). Finally, participants completed a manipulation check, provided demographic information, and were debriefed.

Materials and measures

Baseline closeness

Participants indicated how they would characterize their friendship (1 item; 1 = very distant, 7 = very close) with their named White friend.

Confrontation and group-relevance manipulations

Participants were randomly assigned to read one of the following vignettes and imagine that their White friend either (a) made an in-group-relevant biased comment (see Study 1) or (b) made an out-group-relevant biased comment: “You and (friend’s name) are hanging out after class. (Friend’s name) makes a comment about how your classmate is nice, but would embarrass themselves in an exercise class, because they are fat.” We opted for this control condition because pilot testing (N = 41) revealed it as the most comparable for offensiveness, intentionality, harm, and humor (see the Supplemental Material). Finally, as in Study 1, participants were randomly assigned to imagine and write about confronting or not confronting their friend.

Anticipated friendship quality and understanding

As we focused only on imagined interactions with a friend and not a stranger, we assessed friendship quality in Study 2, instead of relationship quality. Participants reported their anticipated friendship quality (adapted from Hendrick, 1988; Shelton et al., 2010; 9 items; Study 2a: a = .95; Study 2b: a = .97); to capture perceptions that one’s friend exhibits qualities important for a friendship. We used the same measure for anticipated understanding (8 items; Study 2a: a = .92; Study 2b: a = .93) from Study 1.

Results

See Tables 3 and 4 for descriptive statistics and the Supplemental Material for correlations among variables.

Table 3.

Study 2a: Descriptive Statistics by Manipulations for Anticipated Variables

	Confronting condition		Not confronting condition
	In-group relevant (n = 46)	Out-group relevant (n = 29)	In-group relevant (n = 61)	Out-group relevant (n = 42)
Variable	M (SD)	M (SD)	M (SD)	M (SD)
Friendship quality	4.05^a (1.56)	4.13^a (1.10)	3.26^b (1.22)	3.93^a (1.39)
Understanding	4.04^a (1.40)	4.34^a (1.20)	3.20^b (1.17)	3.96^a (1.35)

Note: Different superscripts within a row indicate statistically significant (p < .05) differences. These differences were computed using pairwise comparisons of adjusted means without corrections, adjusting for baseline closeness.

Table 4.

Study 2b: Descriptive Statistics by Manipulations for Anticipated Variables

	Confronting condition		Not confronting condition
	In-group relevant (n = 260)	Out-group relevant (n = 195)	In-group relevant (n = 262)	Out-group relevant (n = 163)
Variable	M (SD)	M (SD)	M (SD)	M (SD)
Friendship quality	3.80^a (1.51)	4.32^b (1.36)	2.94^c (1.35)	3.43^d (1.40)
Understanding	3.77^a (1.46)	4.32^b (1.30)	2.53^c (1.30)	2.99^d (1.36)

Anticipated friendship quality and understanding

We conducted 2 (confrontation: confronting, not confronting) × 2 (group relevance: in-group, out-group) between-subjects analyses of covariance (ANCOVAs) on the participants’ anticipated friendship quality and understanding, adjusting for baseline closeness (see Figs. 2 and 3). Of note, as preregistered, analyses without adjusting for baseline closeness remain consistent for Studies 2 and 3 (see the Supplemental Material). Main effects of confronting emerged: Consistent with predictions and with Study 1, Asian participants who imagined confronting reported higher friendship quality than those who imagined not confronting—Study 2a: F(1, 173) = 9.47, p = .002, η_p² = .05, 90% CI = [.01, .11]; Study 2b: F(1, 875) = 93.48, p < .001, η_p² = .10, 90% CI = [.07, .13]; they also reported greater understanding than those who imagined not confronting—Study 2a: F(1, 173) = 12.39, p = .001, η_p² = .07, 90% CI = [.02, .13]; Study 2b: F(1, 875) = 207.08, p < .001, η_p² = .19, 90% CI = [.15, .23].

Main effects of group relevance emerged: Asian participants who imagined that their friend made an in-group-relevant biased comment reported lower friendship quality than those who imagined that their friend made an out-group-relevant biased comment—Study 2a: F(1, 173) = 5.07, p = .026, η_p² = .03, 90% CI = [.00, .08]; Study 2b: F(1, 875) = 34.69, p < .001, η_p² = .04, 90% CI = [.02, .06]; they also reported lower understanding than those who imagined an out-group-relevant biased comment—Study 2a: F(1, 173) = 8.58, p = .004, η_p² = .05, 90% CI = [.01, .11]; Study 2b: F(1, 875) = 40.37, p < .001, η_p² = .04, 90% CI = [.02, .07]. Contrary to predictions, no interaction emerged for friendship quality—Study 2a: F(1, 173) = 3.43, p = .066; Study 2b: F(1, 875) = .01, p = .929—nor for understanding—Study 2a: F(1, 173) = 1.76, p = .186; Study 2b: F(1, 875) = .18, p = .673.

We conducted mediation analyses with 5,000 bootstrap samples to assess whether the confrontation manipulation (confronting, not confronting) affected anticipated friendship quality through understanding, adjusting for group relevance (in-group, out-group), the Confrontation × Group Relevance interaction term, and baseline closeness (see Table 5 for coefficients; Hayes, 2017). The assessment of joint significance (Yzerbyt et al., 2018) revealed that understanding mediated the effect of confronting (vs. not confronting) on friendship quality (see Table 5). Although we also preregistered that self-disclosure may act as a mediator, we found little evidence for this (see the Supplemental Material for results).

Table 5.

Studies 2a and 2b: Anticipated Understanding Mediation on Anticipated Friendship Quality

		Friendship quality
Coefficient	Descriptive label	Study 2a	Study 2b
a	Confrontation → Understanding	.63** (.19)	1.28*** (.09)
b	Understanding → Friendship Quality	.51*** (.06)	.66*** (.03)
c	Total effect	.53** (.19)	.86*** (.08)
c′	Direct effect	.21 (.16)	.02 (.08)
95% CI, indirect effect	Indirect effect	.32 [.13, .56]	.84 [.71, .98]

Note: Path coefficients, standard errors (in parenthesis), and percentile bootstrap confidence intervals (CIs) around the indirect effect are reported. Confrontation condition was coded as −.5 (not confronting) or .5 (confronting), and group-relevance condition was coded as −.5 (out-group) or .5 (in-group). All models included group relevance and the Confrontation × Group Relevance term as covariates. Path coefficients are as follows: a denotes the effect of confrontation condition on anticipated understanding; b denotes the effect of anticipated understanding on anticipated friendship quality; c denotes the total effect of confrontation manipulation on anticipated friendship quality; and c′ denotes the direct effect of confrontation manipulation on anticipated friendship quality. The indirect effect of paths a and b are also reported. Joint-significance assessment of paths a and b indicated there is joint-significance.

p < .01. ***p < .001.

Effect size and moderating effects of baseline closeness across Study 2a, Study 2b, and Supplemental Study S1

Next, we ran an integrative data analysis (Curran & Hussong, 2009) with participants in the in-group-relevant conditions of Study 2a and Study 2b, and all participants in Supplemental Study S1, to determine the overall effect of confronting (vs. not confronting) a friend for a racially biased comment and to explore the moderating effects of baseline closeness,¹ adjusting for each study (see Fig. 4). This technique regresses friendship quality on confrontation condition, baseline closeness, their interaction, and the effect-coded study variables to find an overall effect across studies. To assess between-study differences, we used fixed-effects modeling and adjusted for between-study effects (Step 1); we also assessed (a) whether study moderates confrontation-condition differences and (b) how confrontation condition and baseline closeness interact (Step 2).

Across studies, a significant main effect of confronting on participants’ reported friendship quality emerged, b = 0.53, SE = .08, t(756) = 6.53, p < .001, η_p² = .05, 90% CI = [.03, .08], such that participants who imagined confronting their friend reported higher friendship quality than those who imagined not confronting. A significant interaction emerged between the confrontation condition and baseline closeness, b = 0.18, SE = .06, t(756) = 3.30, p = .001, η_p² = .01, 90% CI = [.00, .03], such that the effect of confronting on friendship quality was greater the closer the participant felt toward the friend. We followed up on this interaction using the Johnson-Neyman technique for pairwise inference (see Hayes & Montoya, 2017) to identify the point on the baseline closeness scale where the confrontation condition began to have a significant effect on friendship quality. For those who reported they felt closer than “distant” from their friend on the closeness scale (region of significance using the Johnson-Neyman technique: above 2.5 on the baseline closeness item, where 2 = distant and 3 = somewhat distant), there was a significant effect of confrontation condition on friendship quality. This interaction suggests that relational closeness to a perpetrator plays an important role in anticipated outcomes of a confrontation (see the Supplemental Material for full results).

Discussion

Studies 1 and 2 provide consistent evidence that confrontation buffers against the anticipated negative effects of a friend’s bias on friendship quality because of greater anticipated understanding. Contrary to predictions, the target of the bias—that is, whether it was directed at the in-group or at an out-group—did not moderate effects. Given this, expressing one’s egalitarian values more generally (rather than as in-group defense) may underlie the anticipated effects of confronting (vs. not confronting). However, across confronting conditions, participants imagining a friend’s bias toward their in-group (vs. an out-group) reported worse friendship quality. Although imagining that one’s friend holds biased views of one’s in-group is more relationally damaging than out-group bias, confrontation is thought to bolster the relationship in both cases.

An integrative data analysis revealed that the closer participants are to the perpetrator, the more confronting (vs. not confronting) buffers against friendship-quality reduction, suggesting that confronting is thought to be most helpful in close friendships. Finally, the mediating effects of anticipated understanding suggest that confronting can be seen as an opportunity to openly share one’s experiences, perspective, and values. Although people refrain from speaking up to promote relational harmony (DePaulo & Kashy, 1998; Ennis et al., 2008), our results suggest that people anticipate that confronting will help protect their relationships through the understanding gained from honest expression. We next sought to experimentally test this proposed mechanism.

Study 3

Study 3 provides a causal test of anticipated understanding as a mechanism. Asian American participants imagined confronting a White friend’s bias and were randomly assigned to imagine they were understood, misunderstood, or received no information about understanding. We hypothesized that participants who imagined their friend was understanding after a confrontation would anticipate higher friendship quality versus those who imagined low understanding.

Method

Participants

In a preregistered study, 225 Asian American Prolific participants (156 women, M_age = 24.51, SD_age = 8.12) completed an online survey. A sensitivity analysis indicated that the achieved sample size would reliably detect medium-sized effects at 80% power ( f = .21, which translates to η² = .04).

Procedure

Similar to Study 2, after informed consent, participants were asked to name and report on their baseline closeness with their closest White friend; they then read a vignette. Participants imagined they confronted their friend’s biased comment and were randomly assigned to an understanding condition. Next, participants reported their anticipated friendship quality and level of understanding (manipulation check). Consistent with the preregistration, participants also reported their anticipated emotions and self-views (see the Supplemental Material for full reporting). Finally, participants completed demographic information and were debriefed.

Materials and measures

Baseline closeness

Participants answered the same baseline closeness measure about their friend as in Study 2.

Anticipated understanding manipulation

Participants imagined confronting their friend’s anti-Asian comment with the same paradigm as in Studies 1 and 2. Participants were then randomly assigned to consider one of three responses to the confrontation (anticipated-understanding manipulation: no information, low understanding, high understanding). In the no-information condition, participants received no information about their friend’s understanding (identical to the confronting condition in Studies 1 and 2). In the low-understanding condition, participants read, “After this interaction, it seems like (friend’s name) does not get how you feel and does not understand what you were trying to say. Even though you had the opportunity to express yourself and (friend’s name) listened, you do not feel like (friend’s name) relates to your feelings or knows what it’s like to be in your shoes. You leave the interaction feeling misunderstood.” In the high-understanding condition, participants read, “After this interaction, it seems like (friend’s name) gets how you feel and understands what you were trying to say. Since you had the opportunity to express yourself and (friend’s name) listened, you feel like (friend’s name) relates to your feelings and knows what it’s like to be in your shoes. You leave the interaction feeling understood.”

Anticipated friendship quality

We used the same measure for anticipated friendship quality (9 items, a = .97) from Study 2.

Results

See Table 6 for descriptive statistics and the Supplemental Material for correlations among variables.

Table 6.

Study 3: Descriptive Statistics by Manipulation for Anticipated Friendship Quality

	No information (n = 74)	Low understanding (n = 79)	High understanding (n = 72)
Variable	M (SD)	M (SD)	M (SD)
Friendship quality	4.12^a (1.43)	3.38^b (1.39)	4.45^a (1.36)

Note: Different superscripts within a row indicate statistically significant (p < .05) differences. These differences were computed using planned contrasts of adjusted means without corrections, adjusting for baseline closeness.

We conducted a series of one-way (understanding manipulation: no information, low, high) between-groups ANCOVAs (adjusting for baseline closeness) and preregistered planned contrasts on anticipated friendship quality (see Fig. 5). Consistent with predictions, a significant effect of understanding on participants’ reported friendship quality emerged, F(2, 221) = 18.38, p < .001, η_p² = .14, 90% CI = [.08, .21]. Planned contrasts revealed that Asian participants who imagined feeling understood, F(1, 222) = 35.37, p < .001, η_p² = .14, 90% CI = [.07, .21], and those who were given no information about understanding, F(1, 222) = 15.11, p < .001, η_p² = .06, 90% CI = [.02, .12], reported higher friendship quality than those who imagined not feeling understood. No difference emerged between the no-information and high-understanding conditions, F(1, 222) = 2.99, p = .085, suggesting that participants assume understanding following confrontation.

Discussion

Study 3 supports anticipated understanding’s role as a mechanism through which confronting a friend’s biased comment is expected to buffer against reduced friendship quality. Asian participants who imagined high understanding and those given no information did not differ in reported friendship quality, which suggests that, at baseline, participants imagine that their friend would respond with high understanding.

General Discussion

Across four experiments (and a supplemental experiment), we found that when participants imagined confronting a White friend’s bias, the confrontation buffered against Asian participants’ anticipated harm to relationship quality (with no confrontation). These effects emerged consistently even if participants imagined confronting a stranger (Study 1) and even if a friend expressed bias toward an in-group or out-group (Study 2). The effect of confronting on relationship quality was driven by anticipated understanding from the perpetrator (mediation shown correlationally in Studies 1 and 2 and experimentally in Study 3). Across studies, the buffering effect of confronting on friendship quality was stronger for people who felt closer to their friend. Study 3 also suggested that people assume their friends will understand them after the confrontation, indicating a positive expectation from difficult discussions with friends.

Theoretical and practical implications

Enhanced partner understanding following confrontation may inoculate against reduced friendship quality, paralleling previous research in romantic relationships (Gordon & Chen, 2016; Laurenceau et al., 1998). The mediating role of anticipated understanding and the robustness of the effects of confronting across perpetrators (stranger vs. friend) and across the varied targets of the comments (in-group vs. out-group) point to shared reality as a useful explanatory framework. That is, shared-reality theory posits that people seek to establish a sense of mutual understanding in their interpersonal relationships (Higgins et al., 2021). Our results comport with this framework in a novel context (confronting a friend’s biased remarks), suggesting that people may view confronting as an avenue to pursue shared reality with someone, particularly close friends.

Race-related discussions can be perceived as both threats and opportunities (Sanchez et al., 2022) and although confrontations incur costs (Kaiser & Miller, 2001), they may also offer possibilities to repair relationships. Thus, although discussions about race can be anxiety inducing (Trawalter & Richeson, 2008), our findings suggest that people view difficult discussions about race in which they share their perspective and values as an avenue to salvage relations with close others who perpetrate bias. This potentially optimistic view may help to explain why so many people report confronting biased comments from their friends and family (Horowitz et al., 2019).

Limitations and future directions

Participants in these studies anticipated that a close friend would understand them during a confrontation, and such expectations during relational conflict predict positive subsequent interactions (Sanford, 2006). However, further research is needed to examine actual confrontations between friends. This is especially recommended, considering the notable discrepancy between intended and actual confrontations (e.g., Kawakami et al., 2009; Shelton & Stewart, 2004). Further, our research focused on anticipated positive outcomes, but future research could examine additional outcomes, especially negative outcomes beyond feeling misunderstood (e.g., a friend’s anger).

The present research highlights the experiences of Asian people, the fastest-growing racial group in the United States (Frey, 2021) but an underexplored perspective within intergroup relations (see Tropp & Pettigrew, 2005). Subsequent research should explore these effects with members of other stigmatized groups to assess generalizability. Future work should also investigate confrontations of more harmful and offensive forms of bias than the scenarios used in the present studies. Finally, our utilization of college students and online participants (e.g., from Prolific) may limit the generalizability of our findings.

Conclusions

Overall, the current research provides evidence of how people navigate confrontations with friends. Although people report concerns that honesty comes at the expense of a perpetrator’s well-being during difficult conversations (Levine et al., 2020), our research highlights that confrontation, a form of honest expression, is expected to help repair a damaged relationship with a perpetrator. Relational effects are important, because healthy intergroup relationships contribute to enhanced psychological well-being (Bagci et al., 2018). A proposed starting point for healing racial division is to talk to one’s friends (Song, 2019). The present research demonstrates how Asian people expect some of these conversations to unfold.

Supplemental Material

sj-docx-1-pss-10.1177_09567976251372125 – Supplemental material for The Anticipated Relational Effects of Confronting Bias (or not) in Interracial Friendships

Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-pss-10.1177_09567976251372125 for The Anticipated Relational Effects of Confronting Bias (or not) in Interracial Friendships by Ashley L. Berkebile-Weinberg, Riana M. Brown, Casey E. McMahon and Maureen A. Craig in Psychological Science

Footnotes

Transparency

Action Editor: Sylvia Perry

Editor: Patricia J. Bauer

Author Contributions

Ashley L. Berkebile-Weinberg: Conceptualization; Data curation; Formal analysis; Investigation; Methodology; Project administration; Visualization; Writing – original draft; Writing – review & editing.

Riana M. Brown: Conceptualization; Methodology; Project administration; Visualization; Writing – review & editing.

Casey E. McMahon: Data curation; Investigation; Methodology; Validation; Writing – review & editing.

Maureen A. Craig: Conceptualization; Investigation; Methodology; Project administration; Resources; Supervision; Validation; Writing – review & editing.

ORCID iDs

Ashley L. Berkebile-Weinberg

Riana M. Brown

Casey E. McMahon

Maureen A. Craig

Supplemental Material

Additional supporting information can be found at

Notes

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