Chapter 12 - Prejudice Flashcards
What is Prejudice?
-Prejudice: a hostile or negative attitude toward people in a distinguishable group, based solely on their membership in that group (affective part of attitude).
–People can hold prejudices against others based on race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, and even obesity.
(Related to cognitive dissonance)
What is Stereotype?
-Stereotype: a generalization about a group of people in which identical characteristics are assigned to virtually all members of the group, regardless of actual variation among the members (cognitive part of attitude).
–They are another type of schemas (attribution theory is also linked)
-Stereotypes serve to organize information, so that is may readily accessible (automatic processing).
-Once formed, stereotypes can be resistant to change.
What is a negative and positive stereotype?
-Hostile stereotypes: negative stereotypes about groups of people (e.g., women are weaker, less intelligent than men).
-Benevolent stereotypes: “positive” stereotypes of groups of people (e.g., Asian people are good at math). (These stereotypes don’t always lead to positive behaviours/attitudes)
–Although these stereotypes may be “positive”, they create unrealistic expectations and inequitable treatment of members of a particular group.
What is Gender Stereotyping?
-Exaggerates differences between the sexes, and ignores differences in personality traits and abilities within each gender.
-Gender-based stereotypes are established at an early age.
-We associate several occupations with mainly one gender, as reflected in job advertisements.
-Influences choice of profession and also salary expectations.
What is Discrimination?
-Discrimination: unjustified negative or harmful action toward a member of a group simply because of their membership in that group (behavioural part of attitude).
–Any group that is stigmatized in a society will experience discrimination, both blatant and subtle.
What is the way we think?
-Social categorization: we make sense of our social world by putting people into groups according to their characteristics (e.g., gender, ethnicity).
–It is both useful and necessary.
–Categories are typically learned - newborns don’t show this until three months.
-In-Group Bias: the tendency to evaluate in-group members more positively than out-group members.
What is Social Categorization?
-Our tendency to favour our in-group and denigrate the out-group occurs even when people are randomly assigned to groups (Tajifel’s research).
–However, the tendency to discriminate the out-group is even stronger when individuals choose their groups.
Why do we show the in-group bias?
-Belonging to a group gives us a social identity, and
-Having a social identity contributes to self-esteem.
–Minimal group paradigm: created on trivial criteria; we tend to give our own group more benefit of the doubt, more conflict between groups
What does research show (social categorization & in-group bias)?
-Recent research suggests that threats to identity make people more protective of their in-group.
-Also, the more strongly one identifies with their own group, the more likely one is to discriminate against the out-group (Gagnon & Bourhis, 1996).
-Implications of social categorization for reducing prejudice: reduce prejudice by promoting a common identity between in and out-group members, and also by encouraging self-affirmation.
What is the Ultimate Attribution Error?
-Ultimate attribution error: our tendency to make dispositional attributions about an entire group of people.
–For out-groups, poor outcomes are attributed to dispositional causes, whereas successful outcomes are often attributed to situational causes.
What is Realistic Conflict Theory?
-Realistic Conflict Theory: limited resources lead to conflict among groups and result in increased prejudice and discrimination.
–E.g.: Attitudes towards immigration are favourable when unemployment rates are low, and vice versa.
–E.g.: Robbers Cave Experiment (recruited 12 year old boys and divided them into 2 groups, wanted to see what would happen when competition for limited resources was introduced between the 2 groups) (stage 1: bonding stage, before they were aware there was another group; stage 2: competition stage, series of competitions/sports; stage 3: reducing friction period, work together to gather movie to watch a movie)
What is Mutual Interdependence?
-A situation in which two or more groups need each other and must depend on each other to accomplish a goal that is important to both groups.
-Prejudice can be reduced by the creation of common goals.
What is Contact Hypothesis?
-Bringing members of different groups together may reduce prejudice providing certain conditions are met:
–Both groups are of equal status.
–They share a common goal (shared interests).
–They contact involves intergroup cooperation.
The contact is supported by societal social norms.
What is Extended Contact Hypothesis?
-Knowing that a member of one’s own group has a close relationship with a member of another group can reduce prejudice with that group.
What are the individual differences in Prejudice?
-Research shows that people who are high in the following dimensions are more likely to hold negative attitudes towards out-groups than are others:
–Authoritarianism
–Religious fundamentalism
–Social dominance orientation
What is Authoritarianism?
-High degree of submission to authority figures.
-Aggression towards groups that are seen as legitimate targets by authority figures.
-High degree of conformity to rules established by authority figures. (Relates to Group Think)
