09. Prejudice I Flashcards
(30 cards)
Prejudice and psychology
Prejudice shapes research:
- The questions we ask
- How we interpret results
Examples of prejudice in research
- Being gay classified as mental illness until 1973
- Research into ‘gay families’ focused on finding what is ‘wrong’ (genetically)
- IQ testing has racist history and is still used to justify racism (POC having lower IQ)
Prejudice: Definitions
“unfavourable attitude towards a social group and its members” (Hogg & Vaughn, 2018)
“an attitude or orientation towards a group (or its members) that devalues it directly or indirectly, often to the benefit of the self or own group” (Spears & Tausch, 2016, p442)
What are the components of prejudice?
- Cognitive (beliefs and stereotypes)
- Affective (strong, usually negative feelings)
- Conative (intention to behave a certain way towards the group)
Is prejudice always founded on negative feelings?
- Sometimes prejudice is based on positive feelings about the ‘good ones’ in a group
- E.g. Hostile vs benevolent sexism (Glick & Fiske, 1996)
- Benevolent sexism is a positive attitude about the right type of women (meek, unsexual, submissive), indicating a negative attitude towards women that don’t submit to this role
What are the main aspects of Brown’s (2011) modern theories of racism?
(Brown collated modern theories of racism and found similarities)
- Negative attitude to outgroup
- Societal norms discourage ‘old school’ prejudice, so it is expressed in new ways
- Minimisation of effects of prejudice
- Interest in individual differences
How do modern theories disagree (Brown, 2011)?
Theories disagree on whether prejudice has actually changed. Either:
- People are still prejudiced but avoid expressing it
- Prejudice has changed; there are old and new forms and people genuinely do not agree with the old form
Explicit vs implicit prejudice
- Explicit: overt, monitorable belief
- Implicit: unconscious belief
How does social desirability bias change expression of views?
It can cause people to:
- not express views they do hold
- express views that they don’t hold (Jardina and Piston, 2023)
How do we measure implicit beliefs?
The Implicit Association Test
- Based on reaction time
- Longer reaction time = idea is incongruous
- Participants press a key to indicate if a word is correctly paired with another word (Black/Pleasant, White/Pleasant)
What is symbolic/modern racism?
- It explains racism on the right (conservatives)
- They claim prejudice doesn’t exist anymore ∴ we are equal ∴ we shouldn’t prioritise minorities
Who studied Aversive Racism?
Pearson et al., 2009
What is Aversive Racism
(Pearson et al., 2009)?
A theory of modern racism
- It explains racism on the left (liberals)
- A person that supports egalitarianism but has implicit racist beliefs
Evidence for aversive racism
- Penner et al. (2010)
- Black patient with a non-Black physician
- Physicians behaved differently when their implicit racism was higher
- Patients reacted to ‘aversive racists’
Explanations of prejudice:
Individual differences
- Authoritarian personality (Adorno et al., 1950)
- Right Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) (Altemeyer, 1988)
- Social Dominance Orientation (SDO) (Sidanius & Pratto, 1999)
What is the Authoritarian personality?
- Ethnocentrism (cultural superiority)
- Negative attitudes to Jewish & Black people
- Negative attitudes to democracy
- Cynical & pessimistic view of human nature
- Conservatism (economic & political)
How do people develop the Authoritarian Personality?
Authoritarian parenting
Autocratic (one person with all the power) & punitive (punishment-heavy)
Evidence Authoritarian personality is linked to prejudice
F-scale (measure of Authoritarian personality) is positively linked to prejudice (Adorno et al., 1950)
What are the dimensions of RWA (Altemeyer, 1988)?
- Authoritarian submission
- Conventionalism
- Punitiveness against deviants
What does Social Dominance Theory argue?
There are always dominant and subordinant groups
How do dominant groups maintain their power?
- System-wide level processes
- Person-level processes
- Intergroup level processes
What are the system-wide level processes?
- Forces in all societies seek to enhance or attenuate (lessen) the current hierarchy.
- Social institutions (hierarchy enhancing or attenuating)
- Legitimising myths (hierarchy enhancing or attenuating)
What might a hierarchy enhancing social institution do?
- Allocate more resources to the dominant group and less to the subordinate
- Prosecute the subordinate group more harshly (so they are overrepresented in jail) (currently happens to black people)
Intersection of SDO and RWA
High SDO
- Support Hierarchy Enhancing myths and policies
- Higher prejudice toward outgroup
Low SDO
- Support Hierarchy Attenuating myths and policies
- Higher egalitarianism and tolerance
