Stereotypes

Question 1

Stereotypes

Answer 1

Collection of traits that society associates with a particular social group

Question 2

Prejudice

Answer 2

A negative attitude held towards a social group

Question 3

Discrimination

Answer 3

Negative behaviours towards a person because of their group members

Question 4

Social categorisation

Answer 4

Assigning people to groups based on social categories

Question 5

How do we socially categorise

Answer 5

Fuzzy boundaries and revolving around a central prototype

Prototypes are cognitive representations of the most typical features of a category

Category members vary in terms of typicality

Question 6

Why do we socially categorise

Answer 6

Understand- informative for a person perception- allow judgments about disposition

Survival- evolutionarily adaptive, identify members of allied groups

Question 7

Outgroup Homogeneity Effect

JONES, WOOD & QUATTRONE (1981)

Answer 7

View members of an outgroup as more similar to each other than members of the jngorjoc

Question 8

KASSIN, FEIN & MARKUS (2017)

Answer 8

Ingroup- individual feels a sense of membership, belonging and identity

Outgroup- does not feel a sense of membership, belonging and identity

Question 9

QUATTRONE & JONES (1980)

Answer 9

Video of person from their own or other university makes a decision

Likelihood of average member of that university making the same decision

More likely to predict average uni student would respond in same way in outgroup

Question 10

Social explanations

Kernel of truth

Answer 10

Stereotypes based on actual differences between different social groups

Tendency to exaggerate these differences, extend them to all members of group leads to development of stereotypes

Question 11

Social explanations
The stereotype content model
FISKE ET AL (2002)

Answer 11

Princeton trilogy studies- tracked stereotype change for 70 years

Most ethnicity and nationality based stereotypes have changed

Stereotype content reflects changes in society
Classified along 2 dimensions: competence and warmth

Low warmth, low competence= low status, competitive
High warmth, low competence= low status, not competitive
Low warmth, high competence= high status, competitive
High warmth, high competence= high status, not competitive

Question 12

Cognitive explanations
illusory correlation
HAMILTON & GILFORD (1976)

Answer 12

2 statistically infrequent events are paired, correlation overestimated due to their distinctiveness= false illusory correlation

Minority groups perform negative behaviour- better encoding- minority group associated= formation of negative stereotype

Group B negative behaviours should be most distinctive- overestimate number of negative behaviours

Question 13

Stereotype activation

KUNDA & SPENCER (2003)

Answer 13

Degree to which a stereotype is accessible in the mind

Measuring= lexical decision task
-decide whether stimuli presenter in black text are real words or not non-words as quickly as possible, ignoring stimuli in red

Question 14

Stereotype application

KUNDA & SPENCER (2003)

Answer 14

Actual use of activated stereotypes in judgements
e.g., forming an impression

Measuring= measures that assess whether someone uses stereotypes in judgment
e.g., ask ppt to form impression of outgroup member, rate degree they possess certain stereotypic traits

Question 15

Why do people stereotype

Answer 15

‘Energy saving device’- simplified processing, reduces cognitive load

Judgement heuristics- mental shortcut for streamlining social perception

Question 16

MACRAE ET AL (1994)

Answer 16

Dual task paradigm- cognitive resources divided between 2 simultaneous tasks

Ppts given names and personality traits- formed impressions whilst listening to audio task

• given category labels, use stereotypes
• not given category labels, couldn’t use stereotypes

=if using stereotypes saves cognitive resources, ppt remember more of the audio

Question 17

Biases in exposure to information

JOHNSTON & MACRAE (1994)

Answer 17

Impression formation task- presented with list of qs from interview with physics students

• read all questions and answers
• select as many as needed to form impression

Controlled condition view more stereotype confirming questions- rates physics students higher on stereotypic traits

Question 18

Biases in interpretation to information

Answer 18

Negative/stereotypic behaviours attributed to disposition

Positive/ counterstereotypic attributes to situation

HEWSTONE (1990)- negative behaviours attributed to disposition, positive behaviour explained away in outgroup

Question 19

Self-fulfilling prophecy

Answer 19

Expectancies lead us to behave in a way that encourages stereotype consistent behaviour

CHEN & BARGH (1997)
Perceiver condition- subliminally primed with faces of African Americans or Caucasians on dot counting task
=paired perceiver and targets played game of catch phrase, rated verbal behaviour on degree of hostility

Question 20

Is social categorisation automatic?

Answer 20

For-

• cognitive misers- simplify to reasonably deal with info
• categories are basis for normal prejudgment
• categorise salient social categories so much

Against-

• shouldn’t do it when it’s not needed or irrelevant
• categorisation should be ‘goal-dependent’

Question 21

Stereotype threat

STEELE & ARONSON (1995)

Answer 21

Concern experienced when possibility may act consistent with negative stereotypes

Black ppts performed worse on intellectual ability- but performed equally as well when no reference was made to intellectual ability

Question 22

FRANZ ET AL (2004)

Answer 22

IAT to measure racial attitudes
Assigned to threat, no threat or no instruction

=explicit threat higher score indicating white implicit bias

Question 23

disengagement

DAVIES ET AL (2002)

Answer 23

Women exposed to gender-stereotypic TV ads reported less interest in pursuing qualifications/careers in fields involving quantitative skills

Question 24

Reducing stereotype threat

MIYAKE ET AL (2010)

Answer 24

Ppts on introductory physics course completed intervention twice during semester

Values affirming: choose most important value and why it is important to you

Control group: choose least important value and why it is important to others

=women performed significantly better when opportunity to self-affirm personal values

Question 25

Reducing threat

Answer 25

Reframing and repraisal- tests reframed as challenging learning experiences- anxiety seen as helpful

De-emphasise- threatened social identity/ domain