Racial discrimination + Reduction Flashcards
What are some government initiatives that have addressed racial discrimination?
Australian Legislation:
> The Racial Discrimination Act (1975): applies to everyone and makes racial discrimination unlawful in Australia -> great to know that it’s there, but looking back after the event (of discrimination), we need to work on removing the antecedents that result in discrimination.
> However, in 2014, the Government had issues with some of the law (section 18c) - “people do have the right to be bigots, you know…”
> Close the Gap: there is still a 10-year gap in life expectancy between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians -> currently not on track to meet the target of parity by 2031
Measuring racial discrimination (subjective and objective measures)
i) subjective measures:
> Harrell (1994; 1997) developed the Racial and Life Experiences Scale (RALES) - measures daily raced-based micro-aggressions in the past year
> Williams et al. (1997) Everyday Discrimination Scale (EDS). In your day to day life, how often do you experience the following: (9-items)
Problems: current and not retrospective; subjective -> problem of self perception.
ii) objective measures:
> Lynn et al. (2008) conducted ‘Consumer racial discrimination in tipping’. -> tipped the blacks LESS
Audit/hiring discrimination studies
Riach & Rich (1991):
> ‘corresponding testing’ & ‘audit discrimination’ -> job applications w/anglo and vietnamese and greek names.
Result:
> Vietnamese males AND females were denied an interview 33%
> Greek males denied 21.8% and females 11.3%
Booth et al. (2012):
> more recent
> Chinese and middle easteners having to submit more than 50% more applicants
> indigenous also experience discrimination
Not all majorities discriminate against racial minorities
> Can’t have simple us and them mentality - not all majority group members discriminate etc
Australia is a multicultural nation
In White et al. (2010), what are the four different attitudes towards outgroups
How? Measured attitudes (modification of Stephan & Stephan's Intergroup Anxiety Scale) and aculturation orientations (do you want muslims Aus to integrate, become individualistic etc)
Positively correlated to positive attitudes and negatively correlated to negative attitudes towards Muslims:
> Integrationist - hold on to who you are, but adopt a few of our values
> Individualist
Negatively correlated to positive attitudes and positively correlated to negative attitudes towards Muslims:
> Segregationist - come to here and stay in their own areas
> Assimilationist - come to our country and assimilate completely into out values
Note: self-report, therefore could be social desirability
From the Challenging Racism Project (2015), what % of respondents believed that racism was present in Australia?
85%
What is the link between racism and negative health outcomes?
Priest et al. (2013) performed a meta analysis and found 76% of studies revealed a positive associated between reported racism and mental health outcomes - think about the feeling of Adam Goodes
What are some of the moderators of the racism/health relation:
> age, gender, cognitive development, coping responses, social and community response
> Can be looked at for strategies to cope with racism, BUT want to look at preventing it, not just coping.
In Pedersen and Barlow (2008), what is the top-down, bottom-up action approach to reduce racism towards Aboriginals?
Top-down: high level government interventions
Bottom-up: inclusion in schools and universities
Reducing Racism Towards Aboriginal Australians (Pedersen & Barlow, 2008) - how? what? results?
How?
> Lectures on:
> collectivist nature of Abo. culture
> Prejudice and its effect on Abo children
> False beliefs surrounding AA
> Superior spatial skills
> Cultural bias of IQ test towards whites
Note: tutorials complementing the lectures
What?
> 6-week program - amongst 123 university students aged 21
> Completed a series of questions before (pre-test) and after (post-test) a 6-week cultural psychology unit
> Only 50% attrition rate!
Results?
> Some promising results when comparing pre-test to post-test
> significant INCREASE in acceptance of AA or sig. DECREASE
> an INCREASE in the number of sudents who saw SPECIAL TREATMENT of AA as a GOOD thing (Affirmative Action)
> False beliefs about AA DECREASED sig.
Limitations:
> Attrition rates
> No retest - could be priming effect and not longevity
Government (top-down) level policies
The National Anti-racism Strategy (2012 - )
“Racism Stops with Me”:
> organisations - sport, businesses, community, gov. - pledge their commitment to tolerance and anti-racism
Workplace cultural diversity toolkit:
> toolkit to help businesses employ the best person for the job and to minimise the risk of discrimination.
What was the gap in the literature that White and Abu-Rayya (2012) addressed
The longevity of such racial discrimination reduction policies
How?
2-week, 1, 3, 6, and 12 month follow up tests
What were the theories in social psychology which White and Abu-Rayya (2012) adopted
> An area in Social Identity: Dual Identity
Shared identity: Us -> Shared -> Them
> Allport: Contact Hypothesis - electronic intervention
What was the intervention in White and Abu-Rayya (2012) and how long did it go for?
> It was a electronic contact intervention (based on Allport’s contact hypothesis) between Muslim only and Christian only schools
It lasted for 9 weeks
What had previous frameworks to White and Abu-Rayya (2012) failed to incorporate?
> The SOCIAL strengths of of CONTACT
The COGNITIVE advantages of DUAL IDENTITY - retain religious identity but also gain a shared environment (created through care fro Australian environment)
Need CONTACT, but before that can happen, need to COGNTIVELY restructure the thinking towards the group.
What are the four facilitative conditions of Allport’s Contact Theory? What did White and Abu-Rayya (2012) add from Thomas Pettigrew?
> co-operation
a common goal
support from authority
equal status
Added TIME - time for these co-operative condition to take time
