Social Psych Ch. 13 Prejudice

prejudice

a hostile or negative attitude (affect, behavior, cognition) toward people in a distinguishable group, based solely on their membership in that group

stereotypes

a generalization about a group of people in which identical characteristics/category concepts are assigned to virtually all members of a group, regardless of actual variation among the members. the “law of least effort”

schema

a mental structure that organizes one's knowledge about the world

cognitive misers

stereotyping allows humans to behave like ___ ___ - to adopt certain rules of thumb in our attempt to understand other people

Hannah Study (Darley & Gross)

IV: Ps see video of 4th grader "hannah" being tested in poor vs rich environment, but her performance on test is ambiguous

Shown in poor environment: rated below grade level

Shown in rich environment: rated above grade level

When observers did not see video of intelligence test? Rated both poor and rich the same. Watching the ambiguous vids polarized grades based on stereotypes.

DV: Asked to rate hannah on: area scores, overall performance, work habits, motivation, emotional maturity, sociability, cognitive skill

Demonstrates expectancy confirmation == how the pts LOOKED for justifications to rate the girl higher/lower based on her SES

expectancy confirmation

Expectations from stereotypes are not necessarily valid in and of themselves; people will tend to seek out confirmatory evidence

benevolent sexism

fueled by positive stereotypes where women are idealized as being better than men for stereotypically female qualities, ex. being caring/good cooks

*behaviors that are on their face positive but are rooted in women being "less than"

hostile sexism

the belief that women are inferior to men and the endorsement of negative stereotypes of women

"classic" sexism

warmth and competence

all groups can be classified into what two universal dimensions of person perception?

rich: envied

elderly: pitied

middle class: admired

homeless: contempt

discrimination

unjust harmful or negative treatment of someone based solely on their membership in group, can be obvious or subtle

stereotype, emotion, and discrimination

cognitive, affective, and behavioral components of prejudice

institutional discrimination

companies and other institutions are legally permitted/socially encouraged to discriminate on the basis of race, gender, or other categories

microagressions

the slights, indignities, and put-downs that many minorities routinely encounter

ex. white professor complimenting an asian american student for his excellent English, even when he's lived in the US his entire life

anger/insults

activates discrimination

implicit prejudice

slight biases and rarely activated stereotypes that we are not aware of

The Bogus Pipeline

way of identifying explicit but suppressed prejudices

fake lie detector (but ps. thought was real) caused people to express more prejudice compared to when no pipeline was used (identical positive attitudes) because they didn’t want to be caught in a lie (they believe experimenter will be able to tell if they lie)

**based on the assumption that people know what they really feel but prefer to hide those feelings from others

Implicit Association Test (IAT)

how to measure implicit prejudice, based on priming

1. related concepts prime each other = speeds response

2. opposed concepts inhibit each other = slows response

found that people respond more quickly when White faces are paired more with positive words and when Black faces are paired with negative words == the SPEED DIFFERENCE is the measure of their implicit attitudes towards african americans

higher IAT score indicates higher likelihood a person will discriminate against the target in some way

Self-fulfilling prophecy

people respond to behavior in a way that fulfills original stereotype

Cycle: beliefs about others —> action towards others —> behaviors from others

Word, Zanna, & Cooper

demonstrated self-fulfilling prophecy to stereotyping and discrimination

Study 1: white students who interviewed african americans sat further and had shorter interviews vs interviewing white students who sat closer and had a longer interview

Study 2: confederates who interviewed white students in the same manner the white students interviewed african americans (with less interest and sitting further away), and asked judges to rate the applicants

found that applicants who were interviewed the way african americans had been interviewed in the first experiment were judged to be more nervous and less effective when compared to the way white applicants had been originally interviewed

BEHAVIOR reflected the interviewer's expectations

Social Identity Threat, salient, relevant

the feelings and behaviors elicited by knowing that you are being evaluated as a member of your group instead of as an individual, burden of representing your group interferes with ability to do well

1. Identity needs to be ____

2. The task needs to be ____ to the social identity

Steele and Aronson (1995) - GRE

IV: half of white & black students were told that the investigator was interested in measuring their intellectual ability, while the other half of white & black students were told that their score didn't matter and the investigator was more interested in the test taking process

white students of both categories performed equally well/poorly

black students who were told their scores didn't matter performed equally well as the white students, while the black students who were told their score DID matter performed significantly worse than they would otherwise due to social identity threat

self affirmation

way of countering social identity threat - the practice of reminding yourself of your good qualities/experiences that made you feel successful or proud

normative conformity

the tendency to go along with the group in order to fulfill the group's expectations and gain acceptance

*explains why people who hold deep prejudices DON’T act on them, they are conforming to the norms of their social groups

social identity

the part of a person's self-concept that is based on his or her identification with a nation, religious or political group, occupation, or other social affiliation

ethnocentrism

the belief that one's own ethic group, nation, or religion is superior to all others

in-group bias

the tendency to favor members of one's own group and give them special preference over people who belong to other groups; the group can be temporary and trivial as well as significant but still leads to unfair treatment of others

minimal groups

demonstrated by Tajfel - to better understand in group biases, randomly grouped boys using the most trivial criteria imaginable in their experiments

found that when the reasons for differentiation are minimal, being in the in-group makes you want to win against members of the out-group, leading you to treat the out-group unfairly, since it builds your self-esteem and increases feelings of belongingness

out-group homogeneity

The perception that individuals in the out-group are more similar to each other (homogeneous) than they really are, AND more similar than members of the in-group are

Quattrone & Jones demonstrating out-group homogeneity

IV: princeton or rutgers student told the man in the video was either a princeton or rutgers student (in or out-group)

DV: predicted % of males at that institution that would make the same choice

Results: when the target was a part of the out-group, the % was higher, the man in the video was thought to be more predictive of what his peers would choose than compared to when he was an in-group member

blaming the victim

The tendency to blame individuals (make dispositional attributions) for their victimization, typically motivated by a desire to see the world as a fair place

reconstructing situations after the fact to support our belief in a just world == convincing ourselves that the same wouldn't happen to us since the person must've done something to cause the tragedy

Justifying feelings of entitlement and superiority

when a majority discriminates against a minority group, the majority will claim their actions as legitimate since the minority is so obviously inferior and incompetent

*they don't see themselves as being prejudiced, they regard their beliefs about the out-group as perfectly reasonable

*suppressing prejudiced impulses requires constant energy, so people are always on the lookout for information that will justify their discrimination(idea that prejudices are just beneath the surface)

realistic conflict theory

the idea that limited resources lead to conflicts between groups and result in increased prejudice and discrimination

ex: when times are tough and resources are scarce, in group members will feel more threatened by the outgroup vs. when there is no comp. for resources

demonsrates realistic conflict theory

Sherif (1961)

pts. were 12 year old boys randomly assigned to the Eagles or Rattlers

- each group went through team bonding activities to increase the cohesiveness of the group

- then the groups were placed in competitive games to arouse feelings of conflict and tension between the groups

- then during the camp party, the eagles came first and ate all the good food; Rattlers were not happy as a result, calling the Eagles greedy -- BUT the Eagles believed they deserved what they got

== led to full scale riot

contact hypothesis

the view that social interactions between social groups would reduce prejudice

1. sides must have a common goal and must depend on each other to accomplish that goal

2. exposed to more than 1 member of a group

3. get to know others in a friendly, informal setting

4. equal status

5. social norms must promote and support equality

requirements for the contact hypothesis

extended contact effect

simply knowing an in-group member has out-group friends is sufficient to reduce prejudice (spread en masse through media contact)

parasocial contact

getting emotionally connected to and invested in certain characters or celebrities from other social groups

vicarious contact

vicariously witnessing intergroup contact occur through vignettes in the news and entertainment media

intergroup interactions

social interactions between members of different groups == tend to be characterized by mistrust and anxiety, explains why people avoid interactions with people of other groups

high quality contact

like cross-group friendship still predicts less prejudice and greater desire for reconciliation

conditions to reduce prejudice via contact hypothesis

1. both groups are of equal status

2. both share a common goal that generates awareness of their shared interests and common humanity

3. contact involves intergroup connection

4, contact is supported by law or local customs

**studies meeting ALL of these conditions found a stronger link between contact and reducing prejudice BUT are NOT necessary for contact hypothesis

Interdependence

the situation that exists when two or more groups need to depend on one another to accomplish a goal that is important to each of them

ex. in the Robber's cave experiment, the investigators cut off their water supply, forcing the two groups of boys to work together

jigsaw classroom

An interdependent classroom setting designed to reduce prejudice and raise the self-esteem of children by placing them in small, desegregated groups and making each child dependent on the other children in the group to learn the course material and do well in the class == no competition!!

found that students became less prejudiced and liked their groupmates more

Bridgeman(1981)

IV: 10 year old children who spent 2 months participating/not participating in jigsaw classrooms

DV: showed the children cartoons and asked them why the characters reacted a certian way

found that those who participated in the jigsaw classroom had developed the ability to take the perspective of the characters

Devine, et al.'s Habit-Breaking Intervention

People who are:

1. Aware of their biases

2. Concerned about consequences of biases

== will be motivated to make effort of replacing biased responses