PSY220 - 5. Stereotyping & Prejudice

Question 1

AUTOMATICITY

Answer 1

Automatic processes:

1. occur outside of awareness
2. without intention (given an intention to begin, carry on without intention)
3. are efficient (cognitive resources) – able to do under high/low cognitive load

Question 2

Bargh (1990)

Answer 2

Many activities start out controlled, but become automatized with practice.
Drive, or learning how to type
Unconscious as something boring
Freud says unconscious is filled with repressed ideas
Can see through dreams + Freudian slips

Question 3

Bargh (1990)

Answer 3

Contemporary psychologists sees the unconscious as filled with automatized processes that are well practiced which don’t take up a lot of memory
Behavioural measures: reaction times – longer the reaction time, more difficult it is to perform
Fast reaction time – less cognitive resources needed + easier to perform

Question 4

Implicit Association Test

Answer 4

measures automatic associations
dv: reaction time
pair 4 categories up in 2 diff ways
logic: if 1 of those pairings matches the way categories are paired up in one’s head, the person should be quicker to respond to that pairing

Question 5

Implicit Association Test

Answer 5

1 of the conditions: object as positive or negative
longer reaction time to categorize something as black + positive
association between black + negative – produces a slight hesitation
Told to shoot ppl with weapons: greater tendency to shoot black ppl without weapons
Can also tell us about any other unconscious preference: political views, coke vs pepsi

Question 6

Fazio et al.: Sequential priming

Answer 6

Prime (Black or White face)→target word (positive or negative)→was the target word positive or negative?
when there’s a mismatch take longer to respond – black face + positive target word

Question 7

Kawakami et al (2000)

Answer 7

Just as practice causes stereotypes to be learned, practice can cause them to be unlearned.
Used classical conditioning to “unlearn” stereotypic associations.
1. presented with photographs of Blacks and Whites with stereotypic or nonstereotypic trait words presented underneath.

Question 8

Kawakami et al (2000)

Answer 8

2. For Black-stereotypic and White-stereotypic combinations, Ps told to say “NO!” outloud. For Black-counterstereotypic and White-counterstereotypic combinations, told to say “YES!” outloud. (480 trials, approx. 45 min.)
3. Control condition: opposite instructions.
   DV: Stereotype Stroop task. (rationale: If you are processing stereotypic content very easily, it will be harder for you to inhibit that and name the color of the ink.)

Question 9

Kawakami et al (2000)

Answer 9

effects lasted up to 24 hours. Reduced anti-black bias compared to control conditions
BUT:  Consider other, less intensive, less “brute force” methods: (superordinate recategorization, cooperative interdependence)
Incremental Theory (Levy, Stroessner, & Dweck, 1998)

Question 10

Devine (1989)

Answer 10

If stereotyping is automatic…is it inevitable? Is discrimination legally acceptable?
Stereotyping has two components.
1.Automatic activation
2.Controlled application
Activation is largely automatic, application is largely controllable.

Question 11

Devine (1989)

Answer 11

Study 1: Earlier in semester, subjects filled out Modern Racism Scale. In experimental session, subjects (white only) asked to (anonymously and confidentially) write down all the components of the stereotype of African-Americans they could think of.
Results: everyone knew what the stereotypes were regardless if they were racist or not

Question 12

Devine (1989)

Answer 12

1. stared at computer screen. Asked to report when flash appeared in corner.
2. For ½ of subjects, the flash actually a subliminal prime (80 ms) of words stereotypically having to do with African-Americans (e.g., “athletic,” “jazz,” “Harlem”). Important: none of the words had to do with aggression.

Question 13

Devine (1989)

Answer 13

3. Subjects read passage about Donald (race unspecificed). Donald engaged in series of behaviors that prior subjects rated as slightly hostile/aggressive (“Donald demanded his money back from a store clerk immediately after a purchase.”
4. Rated Donald on several trait scales.

Question 14

Devine (1989)

Answer 14

Results: primed with black stereotypes rated Donald as more aggressive, but priming some stereotypic words activated the whole concept of African American which activated the concept of aggression. Effect was true for everyone regardless of degree of prejudice.
Stereotyping inevitable…outside of awareness?

Question 15

Devine (1989): Study 3

Answer 15

1.write an essay simply describing their honest thoughts about Af-Ams. Extensive measures taken to ensure anonymity.
2.Essays content-analyzed for stereotypic content by blind coders.
Results: high in prejudice used more anti-black stereotypes than those low in prejudice. The difference was in their application of stereotype.

Question 16

Devine (1989): Important distinctions between

Answer 16

1. knowledge vs. belief

2. automatic vs. controlled

Question 17

What are high and low-prejudice people doing differently?

Answer 17

Question of willingness to apply stereotypes to stimuli. Low in prejudice unwilling to apply stereotypes. Motivation.

Question 18

Lepore and Brown’s 1997 critique

Answer 18

Devine didn’t just prime the category label “black”. She also used negative aspects of the stereotype such as “poor” and “lazy” as primes. So of course the negative stereotype was accessed given that it was primed directly.
They repeated using Devine primes [e.g. Lazy] in one condition and a more general category prime [Black] in a second condition.

Question 19

Lepore and Brown’s 1997

Answer 19

Type of Prime:
General Category Stereotypic traits
Hi–prej more aggressive attribution more aggressive attrib
Lo–prej no signif. diff more aggressive attrib

Question 20

Lepore and Brown’s 1997

Answer 20

Devine’s original primes lead to her resultsr of no diff betw high/low prej subjects.
Whereas devine suggested activation is the same regardless of prejudice
Low in prejudice: able to stop activation of prejudiced stereotypes in the first place

Question 21

PLANT & DEVINE (1998, 2001): Distinction between internal and external motives to control prejudice and stereotypes.

Answer 21

Internal Motive Scale =IMS
External Motive Scale=EMS
E.G. Items: “I attempt to act nonprejudiced towards blacks because it is personally important to me.” – intrinsic value [versus—“…in order to avoid disapproval from others.” – external motivation]
IMS and EMS are related to other prej scales and to measures of self presentation.

Question 22

PLANT & DEVINE (1998, 2001): Distinction between internal and external motives to control prejudice and stereotypes.

Answer 22

Predictions: High IMS will try to control prej regardless of scrutiny.
High EMS but Low IMS will only try to control prej in public or under scrutiny. These folks most resentful and reactive regarding PC pressure to be nice.

Question 23

PLANT & DEVINE (1998, 2001): Distinction between internal and external motives to control prejudice and stereotypes.

Answer 23

developed scale and test public private predictions.
High in IMS: less likely to apply + show stereotype activation
High in EMS: more likely to show application + stereotype activation

Question 24

How exactly does control enter the picture? What strategies do low-prejudice people use?

Answer 24

Motivation + cognitive load

Question 25

Wegner: Ironic rebound effect

Answer 25

more we try to suppress a thought, more it plagues us. | Dieters spend more time thinking about food than nondieters. Suppressing makes it harder to go away.

Question 26

Wegner: Ironic rebound effect

Answer 26

1.Accessibility – control component 2.cognitive load control component: only works when finding a distraction which requires cognitive resources. We can’t avoid it, we have to be more vigilant Additional layer of thought looking at our own thought - metacognition

Question 27

Process model

Answer 27

1. intentional (controlled) search for distracters | 2. automatic search for examples of unwanted target

Question 28

Wegner: Ironic rebound effect

Answer 28

(BIG IRONY: to avoid something, you have to be constantly vigilant for its presence!) “Early warning system” – thought that “looks at” our thought (metacognition).

Question 29

Wegner: Ironic rebound effect

Answer 29

Low cognitive load: process #1 and process #2 work together successfully. – distractors work well, vigilant system works in the background

Question 30

Wegner: Ironic rebound effect

Answer 30

High cognitive load: process #1 knocked out, but process #2 continues. – process 1 requires cognitive resources not available. Process 2 continues to work, but process 1 can’t do anything about it so that unwanted thought becomes accessible. Result: hyperaccessibility of unwanted thought!

Question 31

Macrae, Bodenhausen, Milne, & Jetten (1994)

Answer 31

PART 1 - 1.asked subjects to imagine + write essay about typical day in life of a skinhead. 2.½ told “avoid using stereotypes in your essay. PART 2 – 1.asked subjects to write a second essay about another skinhead. 2.freedom to write whatever they wanted

Question 32

Macrae, Bodenhausen, Milne, & Jetten (1994)

Answer 32

suppression worked initially in part 1 yielded rebound effect once instructions had been lifted. Telling ppl not to stereotype can backfire once their guard is down. not an effective way to reduce prejudice.

Question 33

What happens to the target of stereotypes?

Answer 33

powerful when domain is important for person | Chronic: can disassociate with the domain + no longer see it as part of their self-esteem

Question 34

Stereotype threat

Answer 34

When individuals fear being reduced to the stereotype…leading to: 1) anxiety – 2) distraction 3) decline in performance.

Question 35

Stereotype threat

Answer 35

for female student taking hard math test: extra concern about confirming stereotype threat of being reduced to a stereotype produces a self-fulfilling prophecy starting out equal, but ending up unequal

Question 36

The Empirical Evidence

Answer 36

Steele & Aronson (1995) Black and White subjects at Stanford University (highly selective) Took difficult standardized verbal test. (All subjects expected to do poorly.)

Question 37

The Empirical Evidence

Answer 37

For some subjects: test introduced as a test of underlying intelligence, intellectual ability. For others: test introduced as a lab problem-solving task unrelated to any real-world underlying ability. DV: subjects’ score on test, statistically controlling for SAT score.

Question 38

The Empirical Evidence

Answer 38

Test: Not IntelligenceTest: Intelligence White 9.0 10.5 Black 8.9 4.9 dramatic drop for black studies – higher scores when framed as non-intellegence test

Question 39

The Empirical Evidence

Answer 39

stereotype lift: superior group members in situation where predicted to succeed helps improve performance did a demograpic quiz, ½ had race question those who had race question showed the decline those who didn’t have the race question showed no drop in performance

Question 40

Spencer and colleagues (1999)

Answer 40

male and female good at math and felt that math was important to their identities. Gave a very difficult standardized math test, one that led all subjects to perform poorly.

Question 41

Spencer and colleagues (1999)

Answer 41

Before taking test, subjects given some background on the test: some subjects told that the test generally showed no gender differences (negative stereotype of women’s ability in math was not relevant to this particular test). Others told that the study did generally show gender differences

Question 42

Spencer and colleagues (1999)

Answer 42

Results: women did poorly on the same test only when the test was framed with gender differences No one is immune: white males will feel stereotype threat when test is framed in terms of race (math test where other participants were asian) Women performed worse than men only when they believed that the test typically yielded gender differences.

Question 43

Frederickson and colleagues:

Answer 43

Male and females asked to evaluate and sample various consumer products. Among the products was an item of clothing that they were supposed to actually try on. For some participants that item of clothing was a crewneck sweater. For others: a bathing suit

Question 44

Frederickson and colleagues:

Answer 44

As they were wearing that item of clothing, brought to a second room to take a challenging math test. In the room was a mirror. What results do you predict?

Question 45

Frederickson and colleagues:

Answer 45

Sweater Bathing Suit Men 4.9 5.5 Women 4.0 2.4 (Evidence of Steele’s anxiety explanation: Women made to feel more anxiety about body – disrupted performance) body image much more of a concern for female undergrads

Question 46

White males can be made to experience stereotype threat. How?

Answer 46

Race/sports (freethrows)

Question 47

How ST impairs performance: Inzlicht, McKay, & Aronson (2005):

Answer 47

Mental fatigue 1. Black and White Ps either had race made salient or not. 2. DV#1: normal Stroop color-naming task. DV#2: Squeezing a handgrip.

Question 48

Inzlicht, McKay, & Aronson (2005)

Answer 48

Only Black/race salient Ps (and not Black/race not salient Ps) showed poorer performance on both tasks. Making race salient cause mental fatigue causing them to perform poorer on the cognitive + physical task Interpretation: Being the target of stigma is mentally and physically exhausting.

Question 49

Incremental (vs. entity) theory of human intelligence

Answer 49

Literacy tests Incremental: malleable Entitiy: traits as fixed Some white/black read traits as malleable/entity When test with fixed traits then devalued