Social problems- Exam 1

Stereotyping

• Cognition (thoughts) about a social category

• Collected info about the social category (traits, qualities, etc.)

• all begins with this

• info must be salient (active in memory) to do anything

Prejudice

• Affect (evaluations/ emotions) toward people based on their membership in a social category

• Occurs when the stereotype is endorsed

Discrimination

• Behavior toward people based on their membership in a social category

• Action driven by prejudicial feelings or activation of stereotype

Stereotype application

• can evoke prejudicial feelings, and the feelings can influence behavior

Stereotype activation

• can influence our perception of a person or situation, which affects our behavior toward them w/o getting feelings involved

• relies on familiarity with or accessibility of the stereotype

• does not guarantee stereotype application- stereotypes can be disregarded or corrected

Pre- 1920s Stereotyping and prejudice research

• Assumption: Prejudice is rational and justified

• Theories: identifying the “deficiencies of backward people"

  • “race theories” sought to find differences between racial groups on degree of evolution and level of intelligence

• Research: ways to demonstrate differences between racial and ethnic groups

1920s- 1930s Stereotyping and prejudice research

• Assumption: Prejudice is irrational and unjustified

• Theories: identifying prejudice as a social problem

• Research: on the measurement and description of prejudice

  • what attitudes make up prejudice? where do they come from?

• Walter Lippman publishes “public Opinion”, first use of stereotype to describe attitudes related to social groups

1930s- 1940s Stereotyping and prejudice research

• Assumption: Prejudice is an unconscious defense mechanism

• Theories: identifying the internal needs and conflicts that prejudice addresses

• Research: experimental approaches testing the presence of prejudice alongside social frustration and hostility

  • if someone was feeling frustrated or resentful, blaming minority groups may alleviate those feelings

1940s- 1950s Stereotyping and prejudice research

• Assumption: Prejudice is a pathology (maladaptive “mental issue”)

• Theories: identifying individual differences that make one person prone to prejudice

• Research: correlating presence of prejudice with specific personality factors, ways of thinking, and attitudes

  • largely a response to the holocaust, people thought “how could someone do this, I could never. it must be a pathology”

• Gordon Allport publishes “The nature of prejudice”

  • attempt to define prejudice as psych phenomenon

  • defined as “ thinking ill of others without sufficient warrant”

  • prejudice in part is a consequence of limited cognitive resources_ we aren’t always able to see people as individuals

1960s Stereotyping and prejudice research

• Assumption: Prejudice is a social/ cultural norm

• Theories: ways in which prejudice is communicated via culture and social structures

• Research: childhood socialization and correlating prejudice with social factors like conformity

1970s Stereotyping and prejudice research

• Assumption: Prejudice is a product of group conflict for resources

• Theories: ways that prejudice served group socioeconomic interests

  • rationalizes economic class divides between white, upper class and non-white, lower class

• Research: shifted to sociologists and historians

  • psych is more interested in the individual than group

  • predominant belief that attitudes did not predict behavior

1980s- present Stereotyping and prejudice research

• Assumption: Prejudice is an outcome of social categorization

• Theories: ways that prejudice is a product of how we categorize people

  • what info do we associate with a group of people in memory?

• Research: experimental, focusing on cognitive processes and the organization of info in memory

  • what info is accessed from memory influences how we perceive things and what behaviors we see as appropriate