ch.6 Flashcards
transformation of prejudice
The Transformation of Prejudice
Two processes contribute to the contradiction between people’s nonprejudiced responses to survey questions and their sometimes prejudiced everyday behaviors:
1. Change in American radical attitudes of prejudice since WWII.
2. People continue to learn prejudiced beliefs through socialization.
. Change in racial attitudes acceptance of prejudice since WWII.
Prior to the war, Jim Crow racism existed:
Acceptance of the belief that Whites were inherently superior to other races as absolute truth.
Firm belief in the rightness of keeping minorities at a distance through racial segregation.
Use of laws and the power of government to establish racially segregated school systems and other forms of discrimination.
After the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education and the Civil Rights Act of 1964:
racial equality was established as an American norm.
Racism changed from being normal to being bad
People continue to learn prejudiced beliefs through socialization.
The negative racial stereotypes and negative emotions associated with those stereotypes still exist in American culture in the form of implicit prejudices.
implicit prejudice– prejudices which people are not aware of having, but still affect emotional responses to and behavior toward minority groups.
theories of contemporary prejudice
Three propositions shared by theories of contemporary prejudice:
America’s social norms have changed in the direction of believing in the principle of equality for all people.
Not everyone has accepted this norm to the same degree.
Even those people who have not yet fully accepted the norm are motivated to act in non prejudiced ways.
symbolic racism
A set of beliefs about Black people as an abstract group rather than as a concrete individuals.
These beliefs portray Black people as morally inferior to White people because Black people supposedly violate traditional (White) American values.
old fashioned racism
Based on belief in the biological inferiority of Black people and the attendant stereotypes of low intelligence, laziness, and so forth.
modern symbolic
Symbolic racism theorists believe that social change has led most White Americans to reject most aspects of old-fashioned racism.
Avoids blatant derogation of outgroups.
Rooted in cultural stereotypes of outgroups and cultural values rather than in people’s direct experiences with members of those groups.
characteristics of modern symbolic racism
Five themes that justify opposition to social policies designed to promote intergroup equality while still endorsing equality as an abstract principle:
Racial prejudice and discrimination no longer exist.
Any remaining Black-White differences in economic outcomes result from Black people’s lack of motivation to work hard enough.
Because Black people are unwilling to work to get what they want, their continuing anger over inequality is unjustified.
Rather than working to get ahead, Black people seek special flavors.
Relative to White people, Black people have been getting more than they deserve economically.
historical roots of modern symbolic prejudice
Old-fashioned or Jim Crow racism was replaced by laissez -faire racism.
laissez faire racism – frames the cause of Black-White differences in economic success in terms of differences in culture and values rather than biologically based ability.
Helps White Americans to justify their traditional privileged position in society.
aversive prejudice
A form of prejudice in which people feel uncomfortable with interacting with members of minority groups.
People who experience aversive prejudice avoid contact with minority groups.
Try to be polite and correct when they do have contact with members of minority groups.
characteristics of aversive prejudice
Aversive prejudice is similar to modern-symbolic racism in that:
People who experience it truly believe in equality but retain implicit negative feelings toward minority groups.
These negative feelings are usually low key, involving discomfort and uneasiness rather than hostility or hatred.
Aversive prejudice postulates that White people absorb implicit negative attitudes toward minority groups while they are growing up.
Aversive prejudice differs from modern-symbolic prejudice in that people who experience aversive prejudice:
Reject the racialized traditional beliefs that support modern-symbolic prejudice and support equality-enhancing social programs.
Are more strongly motivated to see themselves as unprejudiced and lack of prejudice is an important aspect of their self-concepts.
Prefer to avoid most interracial contact because it arouses the negative affect they associate with minority groups.
psychological bases of aversive prejudice
The conflict between these inconsistent values leads to conflicting feelings about racial issues and members of minority groups and to inconsistent behavior toward members of those groups.
Sometimes people experiencing aversive prejudice will discriminate (reflecting their implicit negative feelings), sometimes not (reflecting their egalitarian beliefs).
The characteristics of the situation determine the behavior.
Will not discriminate in situations in which they recognize discrimination—where there is a clear right and wrong.
Will discriminate when they can justify or rationalize a negative response on the basis of some factor other than race.
ambivalent prejudice
White Americans genuinely accept the principles of racial equality.
Many White Americans have developed genuinely positive attitudes toward Black people that exist along with the lingering negative attitudes.
Seeing Black people as having both positive and negative characteristics results in ambivalent attitudes and behavior.
ambivalent attitudes
Sources of ambivalent racial attitudes:
Two sets of American values
value of work – emphasizing personal responsibility, hard work as the means to success, and self-reliance; value-of-work.
egalitarianism – belief that all people should be treated equally and that people have a responsibility to help others who are disadvantaged; equality of outcome.
White people’s beliefs about Black people:
Black people are both deviant and disadvantaged.
psychological conflict
People’s ambivalent attitudes affect their behavior only when they become aware that they have inconsistent feelings toward minority groups.
Conflict occurs between individualistic value system and egalitarian value system.
Conflict threatens the person’s self-image.
People reduce these feelings of threat and negative emotion by behaving in a way that makes one value seem more important than the other.
benevolent prejudice
hostile Prejudice – traditional form of prejudiced, expressed in terms of negative beliefs about and emotional responses to targets of prejudice.
benevolent Prejudice – expressed in terms of apparently positive beliefs and emotional responses to targets of prejudice.
Tone is superficially positive.
Has the same net effect of hostile prejudice of keeping targets of prejudice in subordinate positions in society.
Research has shown positive correlations between measures of hostile and benevolent prejudices.
3 Reasons Benevolent prejudice is an insidious form of bias:
1. They provide the prejudiced person with moral credentials.
2. The targets of the prejudices might buy into them.
3. Benevolent prejudices may be difficult to change.
