7. Social categorisation Flashcards
Explain the robbers’ cave study.
This was set up to test hypotheses about how conditions can be set up so as to create groups, create conflict between groups and resolve that conflict.
It was a naturalistic study.
Participants were a group of 24 12-year-old boys who signed up to go to. the Robbers Cave park. for summer vacation for a few weeks in 1954. The staff at the park were actually social psychologists who had devised a set of manipulations to the physical and social environment to study how groups form, how conflict arises within them, and how this is resolved.
The participants were screened from a list of applicants to ensure they weren’t from socially disadvantaged backgrounds and had no violent backgrounds. These children were wholesome, model children which was important to ensure that any conflict that arose nth e study could not be attributed to any. personal attributes of participants and instead could be attributed to the environment.
The study involves three distinct phases of experimental manipulation:
- in the first phase the researchers set up conditions that they expected to lead to the formation of two distinct. groups, in the second phase they set up conditions to create conflict between these two groups, and in the third phase they set up conditions to resolve that conflict.
- Group formation phase: the aim was to set up two ‘ingroups’- a group. that each member feels to be a part of and is distinct from other groups. The researchers tried to set up these groups by doing various things. They introduced two different groups to the robbers’ cave park on two different days and ensured that the activities they performed were done only with their own group and not with the other group, the outgroup. An outgroup refers to a group a person feels they don’t belong to. Each group was at opposing ends of the park to ensure minimal contact between the 2 groups and the boys were allowed to decide names for their groups- one called themselves the eagles and the other the rattlers. Researchers noted that these conditions led to the boys forming friendships and the establishment of norms within these groups. The labelling of the group led to the creation of an identity and. by applying those labels they demonstrated membership to their group.
- The aim was to create conflict between the groups. They did this by creating goals that were desirable to both groups but had zero-sum outcomes- only one group could attain the goal and the group that attains that goal essentially deprives the other group of attaining it. This was created. via a 5 day tournament between the two groups who were competing to win pocket knives. The groups had to build up points by beating other groups in a set of contests. These involved activities with clear and observable outcomes such as football and activities that were judged by staff such as how well they pitched their tents. The activities judged by staff allowed researchers to manufacture a situation so that regardless of the events of the first four days, both groups had enough points going into the final day that either could win the tournament. At first, the groups were relatively cordial to each other and the winners of the first day showed good sportsmanship to the losers. By the next day, groups were calling each other names, singing insulting songs about the outgroups, and researchers observed that suspicions were growing between the two groups, e.g. believing members of the other group were sabotaging them. There were even fistfights and group members clearly differentiated from the outgroup referring to ‘them’ and ‘us’. Ingroup members constantly spoke about the outgroup members as being less worthy than members of their own group and developed prejudiced views against them. This is ethnocentricism; where people view members of their own group more favourably than members of other groups.
- The aim was to reduce the conflict. Researchers tested two hypotheses here; to what extent would increased contact alone reduce conflict and to what extent would conflict be reduced by persuing goals that were valued by members of both groups and required combined efforts from both groups. The first one involved increasing face to face contact, such as eating dinner together. Where the boys completed tasks alongside each other, but not combined with each other, conflict did not reduce but conflicts were actually exacerbated. The second strategy involved increased contact and also working together to solve problems. E.g. they were given the opportunity to rent a movie but were told they would need to pool their resources to figure out how to pay for it. Suggested resolutions showed a favouritisim to one’s own group and an antagonism to the outgroup. The main findings from this phase were that increased contact alone is insufficient to reduce conflict and actually made things worse but when the groups came together to obtain shared goals, the conflict started to reduce. After they did that, researchers observed acts of generosity between the two groups and the boys started to develop friendships with the other group and rate members of the outgroup less negatively.
This study showed that we can create conflict between groups through fostering a sense of an ingroup identity and by creating a sense of competition for scarce resources in situations with zero-sum outcomes and that this can be resolved through putting. groups in situations where they. have more contact and need to work together to achieve shared goals.
This study tells us about the power situational influences can have over interactions bewteen people.
What did Haslam and Reicher argue about the robbers cave study?
Haslam and Reicher noted that the observer looking at the behaviour of the boys after the conflict had begun would conclude that the antagonism occurred due to the boys having an inherent violent nature however the observer would be misled in thinking that as they don’t see the process of conflict developing over time and how changes in the structural context can bring about changes in the perceptions, feelings and actions of those involved.
They go on to argue that the idea that conflicts have been brought about due to deficiencies in the characteristics of people involved is the dominant narrative we use to explain violence in society today however often our behaviour is shaped by our situation.
Explain Sherif’s realistic conflict theory.
This theory proposes that conflict between groups arises when groups compete over resources that are scarce and have zero-sum outcomes.
The theory argues that where resources are scare and attractive to both groups, this promotes competition and leads to tension and conflict between the groups as a good outcome for one is a necessarily bad outcome for the other. In these situations, the growth of conflict between groups is accompanied by a growing solidarity within groups. such that the ingroup experiences increase in morale, cohesion, and cooperation while at the same time group members. come. to resent members of the outgroup. who they see as holding the potential to frustrate them in their desire to achieve those scarce and valuable resources. The outcome of this is that groups then enter social conflict. WHere groups pursue interdependent goals where they have to work together, this results in cooperation, and in these situations there is no conflict.
This theory argues that the way to reduce conflict between groups is to promote persuing goals that are attractive to both groups and require cooperation to be attainted.
Explain the contact hypothesis by Allport.
This suggests that contact between members. of two competing group scan reduce prejudice between them but is more likely to succeed if other conditions also hold:
- both groups should be of equal status
- both groups should engage in attempts to pursue common goals which require intergroup. cooperation
- there should be support for the contact from authorities, the law, or general norms
There is strong empirical support for the hypothesis: one review showed that in 94% of studies of situations in which these. four conditions. are met, prejudice is reduced after optimal contact conditions. A follow-up study showed that there is a stronger negative correlation between contact and prejudice reduction between members in optimal contact conditions than non-optimal ones.
Explain the minimal group paradigm.
Serif et al. assumed in their robbers cave study that groups are formed through interaction between members, having common goals and interdependence in achieving these.
Tajfel and turner were interested in whether competition between groups for scarce resources is necessary for ethnocentrism and whether this phenomenon could be brought about using more minimal conditions. They were interested in whether the mere act of categorising oneself into a group can lead to ethnocentrism.
Each participant was shown a series of pairs of paintings and were told that half were by the artist Klee and the other half by the artist Kandinsky. The participant had to indicate which of each paintings they preferred and were then led to a separate cubicle to complete the second part of the study where they would make a series of decisions about how they would distribute sums of money. Participants were told that they were either in the group that showed a general preference for Klee or for Kandinsky. They were randomly assigned to these groups, so their group membership was not related to their actaul preferences. They made 44 different decisions about how to distribute a sum of money among members of their own group versus members of the other.
RQ: Would people behave in a way that favoured the group they had been assigned over the other group?
To ensure effects could be attributed only to categorisation and not to any extraneous variables, the procedure was designed to rule out the possibility of other variables coming into play. They ensured there was no-face to face interaction whatsoever between groups or within groups. The group membership was anonymous; they could only identify wether or not they were in the same category as each other. The participant also couldn’t allocate money to themselves, so there is no personal gain to be had by allocating money to members of one’s own group.
It was found that 72 percent of participants mostly allocated resources in way that favoured in group members. 9 percent of them allocated resources equally and 19 percent favoured the out-group. There was a clear tendency to allocate favouring the in group despite having no knowledge about the rest of their group other than that they prefer the same paintings. Participants not only discriminated between groups but also seemed to try and maximise the difference in outcome received by the ingroup relative to the outgrup; participants were not acting in a way that maximised rewards that all participants would receive but rather prioritised the relative position of the ingroup versus the outgroup rather than the absolute position of the ingroup versus the outgroup.
This is a clear display of ethnocentrism and suggests that the roots of ethnocentrism appear in maximising the advantage the ingroup has over the outgroup.
The mere perception of belonging to a group is enough to encourage people to behave in an ethnocentric way.
This questions one of the assumption of realistic conflict theory as it suggests it isn’t necessary for people to share common goals for ethnocentrism.
Explain social identity theory and it’s perspective on groups.
Social identity theory proposes that people have a fundamental desire to be socially connected to others, and categorising oneself into a group provides a person with a sense of self-worth and self-esteem. Having an identity as a group membership provides an important part of one’s self-concept; identifying oneself as part of a group makes us feel good about ourselves and it helps us to think about ourselves in particular ways- we have self-schemas within our self-concept as to what are group memberships are. According to social identity theory, we feel best about ourselves, due to it’s like with self-esteem. where the group to which we belong is in an advantageous position, and this is attained by being better off than the outgroup.
Although originally proposed as an explanation for inter-group conflict, social identity theory has developed to provide a more comprehensive explanation of how people categorise themselves.
This theory proposes that when we categorise ourselves we have to consider what membership of that category entails; what are the key characteristics of that group and how do members think and behave? The identity provides us with a prototype- the idea of how a person in the group thinks, feels or acts based on their group membership. In turn, that gives us guidance as to how to behave if we want to feel we truly belong to the group.
Group membership is central to how we see and define ourselves and can have a marked influence on our own thoughts, feelings, and behaviour as we try conform to the prototype.
Explain terror management theory in relation to groups.
This theory proposes that because we are animals instinctively programmed to preserve ourselves, we find the prospect of our inevitable death terrifying. Just the knowledge we will die creates a feeling of anxiety.
Threats to our existence harm our self-esteem; they make us feel bad and worthless. Threats to our self-esteem provoke anxiety, and when we successfully defend our self-esteem our anxiety drops again. Research has shown that when you do some kind of experimental manipulation that makes people contemplate their own death (a high mortality salience operation), self-esteem is lowered and people feel anxious, however giving someone positive feedback on a personality test buffers against this threat and lessens the anxiety aroused by it. This suggests that while thinking of death can make us feel bad, there are other things that can stave this bad feeling off.
Terror management theory suggests that humans have sought to stave off the anxiety by creating particular world views- shared, symbolic conceptions of reality that give the world some meaning, order and give some permanence to our existence. These world views provide a set of standards for what is valuable to us; the offer us the chance of symbolic immortality and makes us feel part of something more eternal than our individual existence.
Groups give us prototypes for values, attitudes, and characteristics of the group and it’s members- these prototypes represent specific world views. Categorising ourselves into groups involves signing up to that group’s world view. Categorising yourself as a group member boosts your self-esteem by giving you a ready set of beliefs and values (that groups world view). In situations in which a group member feels more anxious about the prospect of their death they should cling more to that groups world view because subscribing to it functions to protect their self esteem. This desire for holding on to a world view might manifest as favouritism for the ingroup over the outgroup.
Explain some studies that support the terror management theory of groups.
A study recruited 46 christians who completed a set of measures about their. background, including a set of 10 who I am questions to elicit information on their values and parents religion. These were used to screen participants for the study and only those who were from Christian denominations were entered into the analysis. They also completed a sense of measures related tot heir stance on miscellaneous social issues such as abortion. Half of the participants then underwent a mortality salience manipulation as part of the preliminary questionnaire pack. This involved describing what would happen they die and what emotions the thought of dying aroused in them.
Researchers collected the responses and then returned with the supposed responses of two other male participants (these were made up responses). On one of the two questionnaires, the participant was jewish (outgroup) and on the other the participant was christian (in group). The two people had generally similar responses to the who am I and the background questionnaire, with one being moderately socially liberal and the other socially conservative. Having read all this information, participants had to rate the favourability of the other 2 participants.
RQ: Will favourability differ according to the mortality salience manipulation?
Where participants had undergone the mortality salient manipulation, their interpersonal judgment scale scores were higher for the christian person than the jewish person, but when there was no mortality salient manipulation there was no difference in favourability.
Where mortality is not salient there are no differences in favourability according to whether a person is an ingroup member or an outgroup member but where mortality has been made salient, participants give more positive in group scores.
Terror management theory proposes this happens because the outgroup is seen to have a different set of beliefs, attitudes and values to the ingroup and their world view is seen as being incompatible with that of the ingroup. The way in which people attempt to affirm their worldview is by denigrating the view and members of the outgroup.
Explain the follow-up study of Greenberg et. al into terror management theory.
151 American students were recruited to what they were told was a study of associations between personality and political attitudes. They completed a set of personality measures and then half of them received the mortality salient manipulation. They were then asked to read an interview which was made to appear as though it had been published in an American political science journal. In the interview, the interviewee had to express their views towards the US and it’s politics.
In the pro US condition, the interviewee acknowledged that there had been some foreign policy mistakes but concluded that the US is generally a great place to be a free thinker. (ingroup)
In the mixed condition, the interviewee was more ambivalent.
In the anti-US condition, the interviewee concluded that the US government should be overthrown. (outgroup)
Participants were asked to rate how favourable they found the interviewee, how far they agreed with their views and how disturbing they found their views. The theory would predict that mortality salience has the greatest impact on ethnocentrism where the outgroup directly threatens the participants own world view.
It was found that those who had experienced the mortality salience condition rated the in group member as the most positive. With regards to the extent to which the participant agreed with the interviewee, where mortality was not made salient views towards the pro and anti US interviewees did differ, however this different was far more marked in the mortality salient condition. Mortality salience did not have an impact on how disturbing participants thought the views of the interviewees were.
When members have experienced a mortality salient condition, they are far more disparaging of members of the outgroup and their views and are much more favourable to those who share their world view.
Explain how social identity theory and terror management theory work together to explain groups.
Social identity theory tells us that when we categorise ourselves into groups we buy into the identity we perceive to categorise that group- that identity consists of a set of attitudes and values that provide a world view. Subscribing to that world view gives our lives a sense of meaning and provides self-esteem. Ethnocentrism arises when people seek to promote the views of ingroup members of that of outgroup ones and seek to protect the world views ingroup from the threat of the outgroup. These challenges can arise from the actions of the outgroup or via anything that makes us contemplate our own mortality.
Self-esteem and the belief in a set of values buffer against the anxiety arising from mortality awareness and one way in which we invest in our world view is by seeking to elevate it above the competing world view. By doing that we shield our self-esteem from the threats of the outgroup.
Explain how theory of planned behaviour can be improved by accounting for social identity theory.
It has been argued that social identity is one of the variables that woks alongside perceived behavioural control, attitudes and subjective norms in theory of planned behaviour to form intentions and behaviour.
A study by Gardner et al. found evidence of identity playing a part in theory of planned behaviour. Participants were asked if they identified as being the type of person who would drink more than 8 unites of alcohol and it was found that identity explained 6% more variance in intention than TPB variable. The sense of who you are brings a set of rules and a world-view, so our identities encourage us to do certain behaviours. Theory of planned behaviour does not account for this.
Explain how social identity can be used for attitude change.
One way in which people can be encouraged to change their behaviour is by appealing to their sense of identity and getting them to try and adopt particular identities as wrapped up in these identities are rules that dictate whether behaviours are concordant with out identity.
One study looked at ex-smokers who had quit smoking in the past year. They followed up on them three months after they quit and their post-quit identity was measured. People were asked to what extent did they still think of themselves as being a smoker and to what extent did they think of themselves as being a non-smoker. It was found that those who saw themselves as being non-smokers were significantly more likely to have stayed abstinent at the follow up than those who still identified as smokers. This highlighted the importance of making the mental transition after a quit-attempt.
Explain how social identity can be used for persuasion.
Identity is at play in a lot of persuasion attempts in adverts. They will try and appeal to the ingroup and talk about a precious resource to the ingroup that is taken by the outgroup.
Explain how the media use social identity theory.
Identity is often drawn on in the media when talking about immigrants, making them the ‘outgroup’. They refer to a ‘we’ and ‘us’ and ‘them’.
What is identity leadership?
Evidence suggests that if you look back at the people who were nazi concentration guards, it is clear that they knew what they were doing and were not simply following orders and that they took pride in it. They were working towards the goals of the Nazi party, which draws on a concept called identity leadership. This is where people can get other people to follow them and go along with what they’re saying by creating an identity that those following them actually buy into as members will sign up to their goals and aims.
