Tajfel: minimal group paradigm

Question 1

Background - Sherif

Answer 1

1. Born in Poland
2. Studied chemistry in france
3. Soldier in WWII
4. Studied psychology

Question 2

Background - discrimination

Answer 2

1. His experiences in the war led to his interest in refugees, minority groups and prejudice
2. Interested in the fact that the way people act and are treated is often determined by group membership
3. Recognised that ‘the self’ is personal and social
4. His work reflected a general interest in the social and contextual aspects of human behaviour

Question 3

Background - realistic conflict theory

Answer 3

Is realistic conflict over scarce resources necessary to create competition and tensions between groups or merely sufficient

Question 4

The studies - rationale

Answer 4

1. What are the minimum conditions for groups to display ingroup favouritism and ethnocentrism
2. Is negative interdependence over scarce resources necessary to elicit discrimination as proposed by Sherif

Question 5

The studies - minimal group paradigm

Answer 5

1. Minimal conditions for intergroup discrimination
2. Categorisation into two distinct groups - social categorisation
3. Real decisions about the distribution and consequences but not based on scarce resources - no realistic competition
4. No advantage for the individual making a distribution choice - no self interest
5. No knowledge of the identity of ingroup/outgroup members - no interpersonal favouritism
6. No face to face interaction
7. No advantage of belonging to a particular group
8. No logical reason for holding a negative attitude against the outgroup

Question 6

The studies - participants

Answer 6

1. N=64 boys, 14-15 years
2. From comprehensive school in bristol

Question 7

The studies - design and procedure

Answer 7

1. Categorisation based on arbitrary criterion - study 1 was over or underestimate of dots, study 2 was Klee vs Kandinsky where participants were taken to separate cubicles and told which group they were in
2. Tajfel matrices - given a booklet of matrices and told their task was to assign rewards to anonymous members of each group, not themselves, value of each point was 0.1 of a penny
3. Result options are fair distribution, maximising the amount from the experimenter regardless of who it goes to, maximum ingroup profit, maximum differentiation

Question 8

Results

Answer 8

1. Across a range of studies, boys adopt a strategy which is a compromise between fairness and maximum differentiation in favour of the ingroup
2. “In a situation devoid of the usual trappings of ingroup membership and all the vagaries of interacting with an outgroup the subjects still act in terms of their ingroup membership and an intergroup categorisation. Their actions are unambiguously directed at favoring the members of the ingroup as against the members of the outgroup. This happens despite the fact that an alternative strategy - acting in terms of the greatest common good - is clearly open to them at a relatively small cost” - Tajfel
3. Relative group gain more important than absolute group gain and maximum overall gain
4. “Discriminatory intergroup behaviour cannot be fully understood if it is considered solely in terms of ‘objective’ conflict of interests or in terms of deep-seated motives that it may serve” - Tajfel
5. Social categorisation is a necessary condition to create intergroup discrimination/ingroup favouritism
6. Competition over scarce resources is not necessary but is sufficient

Question 9

Debate and controversy - generic competitive norm

Answer 9

1. Generic competitive norm - but where does it come from, and there’s evidence that fairness is a norm
2. Follow up studies - role playing instead of categorisation leads to fairness, but less ingroup favouritism among groups with less competitive value

Question 10

debate and controversy - meaning

Answer 10

Meaning - when participants categorised themselves as members of a group this gave their behaviour distinct meaning

Question 11

debate and controversy - positive distinctiveness

Answer 11

Positive distinctiveness - if differentiated, they’re going to want to be different positively, differentiating the infroup from a relevant comparison group on valued dimensions, social categorisation - social identity - social comparison

Question 12

debate and controversy - self esteem hypothesis

Answer 12

1. Self esteem hypothesis - positive distinctiveness creates a positive social identity which in turn reflects positively on the individual - collective self esteem
2. Follow up studies - not all tests of the self esteem hypothesis found evidence that maximum differentiation leads to higher self esteem but support for self esteem hypothesis when self esteem is measured on the group-level as context dependent on a valued dimension

Question 13

debate and controversy - demand characteristics

Answer 13

1. Participants understanding what they are meant or expected to do
2. Follow up studies - even when participants don’t want to please the experimenter, effect still persists
3. If participants are told what is expected the effect is amplified

Question 14

debate and controversy - role of similarity

Answer 14

1. Participants work on the assumption that they are more similar to ingroup members than outgroup members
2. Similarity - attraction principle
3. Follow up studies - social categorisation produces stronger ingroup favouritism than similarity, stronger ingroup favouritism when the outgroup is more similar - stronger need for distinctiveness

Question 15

debate and controversy - maximum vs minimum conditions

Answer 15

1. Trivial categorisation is the only information to create a meaningful task - need for creative distinctiveness
2. Distribution of points/ money on matrices only meaningful way to achieve intergroup differentiation
3. Only one outgroup for comparison

Question 16

debate and controversy - economic models of human rationality

Answer 16

1. Its not about individual self interest and personal economic gain
2. Not about maximum overall gain
3. Participants would rather give less money to an ingroup member than risking a situation in which an outgroup member receives more money
4. Like Sherif, Tajfel believed prejudice and other intergroup phenomena were grounded in social relations and social realities
5. He did not believe that prejudice was an automatic product of a cognitive bias
6. Not social categorisation = bias and conflict
7. To understand prejudice you have to look at the content of social identity and to its groundings in intergroup relations
8. However, as part of a cognitive approach to prejudice minimal group studies are routinely used to argue the opposite

Question 17

impact and legacy - theory impact

Answer 17

1. Tajfel was fundamentally opposed to reductionism, individualism, a-contextualism
2. European perspective
3. Ironically the minimal group paradigm aims to produce a vacuum in which outside influences are minimised
4. Not possible because subjects bring in their own experience etc.
5. Social identity theory - impact on intergroup relations, social change, social stigma, leadership, crowd behaviour, organisation behaviour, online and CCTV effects on behaviour, social emotions, social influence, other classic studies, political science, education

Question 18

Impact and legacy - practical impact

Answer 18

Practical impact:
Social cure - identifying with several social groups protects health, makes people more resilient, promotes recovery