Lecture 7 - Prejudice & Discrimination Flashcards
What is prejudice?
A social orientation and based on a ‘faulty’ belief
What are the roots of prejudive?
Competition
What did Sherif et al (1961) find in their Robber’s Cave studies?
- Competition for resources → prejudice and discrimination
- But eliminating competition didn’t eliminate prejudice
- Mere knowledge of other group enough to provoke name-calling
What is social categorisation?
“us vs them”
Is explicit prejudice decreasing?
- Stereotypes are generally becoming more positive (see last lecture)
- Greater representation of ethnic (and other) minority groups in non-stereotypical roles in media
- Increased participation of ethnic (and other) minority groups in professional occupations & managerial positions
Is prejudice a thing of the past?
Definitely not
- Huge inequalities between groups still exist
- Rise of nationalism and populism fueled by stereotypes & prejudice
- Gains in public acceptance of some groups haven’t spread to all groups
What participants did Sigall & Page use in their 1971 study?
60 male participants – half indicated how characteristic they felt each of a series of 22 traits was of “Americans”, the other half did the same for “African Americans”
What did Sigall and Page do in their 1971 study?
Within each group half the participants were led to believe that an independent and distortion-free physiological measure of their attitudes was being obtained (a.k.a. bogus pipeline = “polygraph” style machine to reduce social desirability)
What did Sigall and Page find in their 1971 study?
Perceptions of European Americans don’t differ between control and bogus pipeline condition
- However, more negative traits attributed to African Americans when participants thought their true attitudes would be observable (bogus pipeline condition)
Who studied unobtrusive observations?
Crosby et al. (1980) reviewed naturalistic studies that had observed helping behaviour in inter-ethnic settings
What did Crosby et al (1980) find?
- 50% of studies showed more help was given to someone of same ethnicity.
- However, for white people only, helping behaviour was context dependent:
- Face-to-face, 1/3 of studies found the pro-white bias
- No face-to-face contact (e.g., telephone request), ¾ showed pro-white bias
What is unconscious association?
- Classic research shows that there are problems with trying to understand prejudice by asking people explicitly what they are thinking
- More recently, attitude researchers have developed means of measuring unconscious associations between evaluations and concepts
What is aversive racism?
Aversive racism is expressed by anxiety in/avoidance of inter-ethnic settings particularly when norms for appropriate behaviour are unclear or behaviour can be justified
What consequence does confronting prejudice have?
Negative interpersonal consequences
What consequences does not confronting prejudice have?
Negative personal consequences
What conditions need to be met when challenging prejudice through intergroup contact according to Allport?
- Equal status
- Cooperation
- Common goals
- Institutional support
What is equal status?
Members of contact situation should not have an unequal or hierarchical relationship
What is cooperation?
Members should work together in a non-competitive environment
What is common goals?
Members must rely on each other to achieve a shared desired goal
What is institutional support?
Authorities should support positive contact
What is the common ingroup identity model?
To the extent that individuals from different social groups come to view themselves as belonging to a single social entity, attitudes may become more positive
