Whistling Vivaldi Summary
Steele, Claude M.

Whistling Vivaldi Overview

Whistling Vivaldi: How Stereotypes Affect Us and What We Can Do, is social psychologist Claude Steele's first book. In it, he discusses his work studying the psychological effects of being stereotyped, and how to overcome them. Though the title takes its name from an incident in the 1970s, Steele's work is more relevant than ever, as he talks about how to overcome the pressures marginalized groups face daily, even when no one thinks they are actively discriminating. Steele focuses on a few key themes, like outright bias versus unseen pressures, the concentration of factors, the observer effect, taking issues from real life to the lab and back again, and how problems can be solved if they can be understood.