Module 5: Stereotype Activation and Application

What happened in the Ann Hopkins case?

She was judged against prescriptive gender stereotypes and told to behave and appear more feminine.

What is stereotype knowledge?

Knowing that a cultural stereotype exists.

What is stereotype endorsement?

Personally believing the stereotype is true.

What is stereotype activation?

A stereotype becoming mentally accessible.

What is stereotype application?

Using an activated stereotype to judge or respond to someone.

What is the 4-step social judgment process?

Notice cues → categorize → activate stereotype → apply it unless motivated and able to inhibit it.

Is progression from categorization to application usually deliberate?

No. It is often rapid, automatic, and unconscious.

What is automatic activation?

Stereotype activation that occurs without effort or conscious thought.

Why can categorization automatically activate stereotypes?

Culture creates strong learned links between categories and stereotypic traits.

How can researchers measure activation without measuring application?

Word-stem or word-fragment completion tasks.

How does prototypicality affect activation?

More prototypical group members tend to activate stereotypes more strongly.

How does context affect stereotype activation?

Context can determine which subtype or part of a stereotype becomes active.

What did Wittenbrink, Judd, and Park (2001) show?

Black men shown in BBQ/church settings activated more positive associations than those shown on urban streets.

How does prejudice affect activation?

Higher-prejudice people tend to have stronger, more accessible category-stereotype links.

How does cognitive busyness affect initial activation?

It can reduce activation because working-memory resources are occupied.

When your working memory is busy, it hogs the mental energy needed to trigger a thought or stereotype, effectively blocking it from activating.

Because your working memory is overloaded, your brain lacks the energy to process new, specific details about a person or situation. To save effort, it takes a mental shortcut and heavily applies the pre-existing stereotype. (it increases application)

What did Gilbert and Hixon (1991) find about activation?

Busy participants were less likely to activate Asian stereotypes than non-busy participants.

When Gilbert and Hixon (1991) exposed participants to an Asian experimenter, those who were cognitively busy (distracted by a secondary task, like memorizing numbers) failed to activate the Asian stereotype. In contrast, participants who were not busy automatically activated it.

This proved that if your working memory is overloaded, your brain lacks the resources required to trigger and open up a stereotype in the first place.

Can physical features directly activate stereotypes without full categorization?

Yes. Some cue-based associations can activate directly from visible features.

Instead of your brain going through a long, step-by-step process like "That person belongs to Group X, and Group X is known for Y, so this person must be Y," a single physical detail acts like a cognitive shortcut. It hooks directly into a stereotype in your mind before you even fully realize what you are looking at

What is a comprehension goal?

A goal to accurately understand or form an impression of someone.

A psychological motivation to form an accurate, clear, and objective understanding of another person or situation

How can self-enhancement goals affect activation?

Stereotypes may activate when using them helps protect self-esteem.

Self-enhancement goals strategically turn stereotype activation up or down depending on what your self-esteem needs at that exact moment

When the doctor gave negative feedback (threatening the participant's ego), participants rapidly activated racial stereotypes to dismiss his competence.

When the doctor gave positive feedback (boosting the participant's ego), participants inhibited the racial stereotype and instead activated the highly esteemed "doctor" stereotype to maximize their own praise

What is a chronic egalitarian goal?

A strong, lasting motivation to avoid prejudice and value equality.

What is stereotype relevance?

Only stereotypes useful to the current judgment are especially likely to activate.

How directly a specific stereotype applies to the current situation, task, or behavior being observed

How long do activated stereotypes usually remain accessible?

About 12 minutes, although they can be easily reactivated.

What is individuating information?

Information about a specific person rather than their group.

It is the opposite of a stereotype. Instead of looking at someone as a generic representative of a social group (like their race, gender, or age), individuating information allows you to see them as a distinct individual

When is individuating information used more?

When someone is motivated to make an accurate judgment.

What is need for cognition?

A tendency to enjoy and engage in effortful thinking.

What is need for closure?

A desire to reach a quick, definite answer and avoid ambiguity.

How does social power affect stereotype application?

People with greater power are more likely to rely on stereotypes.

How does cognitive busyness affect application?

Once a stereotype is activated, busyness makes it more likely to be applied.

What is the Gilbert and Hixon “paradox”?

Busyness reduces activation but increases application if activation has already occurred.

How do stereotypes affect ambiguous behavior?

Ambiguous behavior tends to be interpreted in a stereotype-consistent way.

When a person's behavior is vague or open to interpretation, your brain automatically uses stereotypes as a lens to fill in the blanks, twisting the meaning to fit your pre-existing beliefs.

Because ambiguous behavior lacks a clear, obvious meaning, it creates a moment of mental uncertainty. To save energy and make sense of the situation quickly, your brain looks to the person's social group for clues.

What did the Hannah study show?

The same academic performance was judged differently depending on whether Hannah was believed to be high or low SES.

Participants watched the exact same video of a young girl named Hannah performing ambiguously on an academic test. However, those led to believe she was wealthy (high SES) rated her ability as above grade level, while those who thought she was poor (low SES) rated her as below grade level

How did stereotypes affect memory in the Hannah study?

Participants remembered more stereotype-consistent details and distorted her performance accordingly.

What was the Amadou Diallo case used to illustrate?

How racial stereotypes can influence split-second threat judgments.

What is shooter bias?

A racial bias in rapid decisions about whether someone is armed or dangerous.

A form of implicit bias where people are faster and more likely to mistakenly "shoot" an unarmed Black target than an unarmed White target

Does shooter bias necessarily mean explicit prejudice?

No. It can reflect automatic cultural stereotype knowledge.

No, shooter bias is not a reflection of explicit prejudice or conscious racism. Instead, it is an implicit, automatic brain response driven by constant exposure to cultural stereotypes in media and society

What are 2 major consequences of stereotype use?

Biased interpretation of behavior and biased evaluation of people or cultural products.

What did the rap vs. country study show?

The same lyrics were judged more negatively when labeled as rap than country.