Lecture 7: Individual Differences Flashcards
why do we study individual differences?
People show meaningful variability on a lot of things in life
Caruso et al., 2009
manipulated a candidate’s image by making their skin lighter and darker. Found that out of those who agreed with the candidate, more people found the lightened image representative than the darkened image. The same effect was found for disagreeing with the candidate, where more people found the darker image more representative.
Caruso et al. Obama follow-up study
they used Obama’s picture and found that Liberals found the lightened image more representative and Conservatives found the darkened image more representative
Rensis Likert
translated abstract attitudes into numerical data
Likert scale
scale from 1-5 where respondents select the option best corresponding to their attitude
development of modern racism theory
developed by political scientists in the 1970s and 80s
modern/ symbolic racism theory states that
People were no longer willing to accept or report more blatant forms of prejudice, so we must use indirect approaches to measure racial attitudes
direct measures of racial attitudes
Prejudice index
Racial stereotypes measure
Subtle and blatant prejudice
what might hinder direct measures?
self-preservation factors
what might hinder indirect measures?
irrelevant factors
link between self-report scale & IAT
As items get more direct, the shared variance with race IAT increases. Positive correlation r= .47
did correlational studies find that self-presentation concerns had a big effect on reported prejudice
not as big a deterrent as expected; the best way to find out about racial attitudes is to ask
right-wing authoritarianism
A scale and construct first defined by Canadian psychologist Robert Altemeyer in 1981
why was right-ring authoritarianism developed
to identify people who are willing to submit to authorities who strongly adhere to societal conventions and norms
RWA & prejudice
RWA is a strong predictor of intergroup prejudice
RWA is correlated with
(from most to least correlated)
- anti-feminist prejudice
- political orientation (Conservatism)
- anti-Gay prejudice
- anti-Black prejudice
- anti-disability prejudice
why is it theorized that right-wing authoritarianism is connected to prejudice?
due to RWA’s connection to mental inflexibility and attitudes toward groups that violate current conventions
RWA and political orientation
fairly highly correlated at r= .65
political orientation
The degree to which a person self-identifies as liberal or conservative
need for closure
an individual’s desire to arrive at a form answer to avoid feelings of ambiguity
need for closure and conservatism
Need for closure is consistently found to be related to the degree to which someone identifies as conservative r= .20
why is it theorized that need for closure is connected to conservatism?
A need for closure and need for stereotypical thinking allows for a more simplified view of the world
perceptions of androgyny study
Participants viewed targets varying in androgyny and had to categorize them as male or female as quickly as possible. Afterwards, participants reported how positive they felt towards each face and finally reported their political ideology. Conservative participants evaluated androgynous targets more negatively partly because it took them longer to categorize more androgynous faces. The same pattern didn’t appear for liberals
use of physical appearance study
Participants reported how confident they are in inferring social group membership from physical appearance. In every category, conservatives were more confident that social group membership could be inferred from physical appearance. Participants also completed a measure of the need for structure. Can partially help inform ideological debates around certain political issues like racial profiling or ‘stop and frisk’
need for structure
how much a person enjoys having a lack of ambiguity
example of an indirect approach sample item
Black people are getting too demanding in their push for equal rights
