A study entitled "The Opportunity Cost of Admission Preferences at Elite Universities," published in the June issue of Social Science Quarterly, found that eliminating affirmative action would cause sharp drops in the number of black and Hispanic students enrolled at elite institutions, but significantly raise the number of Asian-American students, while having little effect on white students. If affirmative action were eliminated, the acceptance rates for black applicants would fall to 12.2 percent from 33.7 percent, while the acceptance rates for Hispanic applicants would drop to 12.9 percent from 26.8 percent, but Asian-American students would fill nearly 80 percent of the spaces not taken by black and Hispanic students, the study found.
The study was conducted by Thomas J. Espenshade, a professor of sociology, and Chang Y. Chung, a statistical programmer at Princeton's Office of Population Research. They looked at the race, sex, SAT scores, and legacy status, among other characteristics, of more than 124,000 applicants to elite colleges and universities.
Stephen H. Balch, president of the National Association of Scholars, which opposes racial preferences in admissions, said the study's findings revealed that affirmative-action policies are "about discrimination." (Source: Eric Hoover, Chronicle of Higher Education, Jun 8. 2005).