These gaps in test scores have been documented over the years and are applicable to various standardized tests but are most apparent in SAT I test scores. In 1988, Christopher Jencks and Meredith Phillips collaborated on the editing of the book The Black-White Test Score Gap. In their introduction, they attest to the fact that African Americans score lower than whites on the SAT. They go on to say that this breach is apparent even at extremely young ages (roughly 4 and 5 years) and last into adulthood. According to Jenks, "the average black student scores below 70 to 80 percent of the white students of the same age. Similar issues arise when Mexican American and Latino students, as well as Native American students, are compared to white students." (www.pbs.org) One specific study documented and compared the scores of black and white students entering college in the Fall of 1999. This study reported that the average score of African American students' verbal portion were 93 points below that of Caucasian students and 106 points lower in the math portion. Phillips, surprisingly, does not attribute this discontinuity to family income at all, but rather to issues that are traced back along the child's lineage. I believe that income does play a role into SAT scores, but will address that issue later. Phillips believes that part of the explanation for the gap is based on the fact that African American parents are more highly likely to have grown up in a less favorable environment than white parents of equal socioeconomic standing. This means that the gap could indirectly be caused by the "widespread discrimination in housing, education and employment that African American children's grandparents faced". (www.pbs.org).
Phillip's reasoning, however, is not the only way to rationalize the gap in test scores. Claude Steele, a professor of psychology at Stanford University has imparted another way to account for it.