Prejudice: Causes and Cures Chapter 13

1. Prejudice: Causes and Cures Chapter 13 “The world is full of pots jeering at kettles.” - Francois de la Rochefoucauld Maxims, 1665

2. Prejudice: The Ubiquitous Social Phenomenon Many aspects of your identity can cause you to be labeled and discriminated against.

3. Prejudice and Self-Esteem • Clark and Clark (1947) demonstrated that African American children as young as three already thought it was not particularly desirable to be black. • Children were offered a choice between playing with a white doll and playing with a black doll. The great majority of them rejected the black doll, feeling that the white doll was prettier and generally superior.

4. Prejudice Defined Prejudice A hostile or negative attitude toward people in a distinguishable group, based solely on their membership in that group.

5. Stereotypes: The Cognitive Component Stereotype . Once formed, stereotypes are resistant to change on the basis of new information.

6. Stereotypes: The Cognitive Component • Sports, Race, and Attribution • Stereotypes, Attribution, and Gender

7. Discrimination:The Behavioral Component Discrimination An unjustified negative or harmful action toward the members of a group simply because of their membership in that group.

8. Discrimination against Homosexuals Several studies have shown homosexuals face much discrimination and antipathy in day-to-day lives.

9. What Causes Prejudice?

10. The Way We Think: Social Cognition Our first explanation for what causes prejudice is that it is the inevitable byproduct of the way we process and organize information.

11. Social Categorization: Us versus Them • The first step in prejudice is the creation of groups—putting some people into one group based on certain characteristics and others into another group based on their different characteristics.

12. In-Group Bias In-Group Bias Positive feelings and special treatment for people we have defined as being part of our in-group and negative feelings and unfair treatment for others simply because we have defined them as being in the out-group.

13. Out-Group Homogeneity OUT-GROUP HOMOGENEITY The belief that “they” are all alike.

14. The Failure of Logic Even people who are usually sensible become relatively immune to rational, logical arguments when it comes to their prejudice. Why is this so?

15. The Persistence of Stereotypes Stereotypes reflect cultural beliefs. Even if we don’t believe these stereotypes, we can easily recognize them as common beliefs held by others.

16. Automatic and ControlledProcessing of Stereotypes • An automatic process is one over which we have no control. • Stereotypes are automatically triggered under certain conditions—they just pop into one’s mind.

17. The Justification-Suppression Model of Prejudice • According to Crandall and Eschleman’s (2003) model, most people struggle between their urge to express prejudice and need to maintain positive self-concept (as a non-bigot). • .

18. The Illusory Correlation Illusory Correlation When we expect two things to be related, we fool ourselves into believing that they are actually unrelated.

19. Can We Change Stereotypical Beliefs?

20. How We Assign Meaning: Attributional Biases Dispositional versus Situational Explanations • One reason stereotypes are so insidious and persistent is the human tendency to make dispositional attributions. Ultimate Attribution Error Our tendency to make dispositional attributions about an individual’s negative behavior to an entire group of people.

21. Dispositional versusSituational Explanations

22. Stereotype Threat

23. Expectations and Distortions

24. Blaming the Victim When empathy is absent, it can be hard to avoid blaming the victim for his or her plight.

25. Self-fulfilling Prophecies On a societal level, the insidiousness of the self-fulfilling prophecy goes far.

26. Prejudice and Economic Competition: Realistic Conflict Theory • Realistic conflict theory holds that limited resources lead to conflict among groups and result in prejudice and discrimination.

27. The Role of the Scapegoat Research on scapegoating shows that individuals, when frustrated or unhappy, tend to displace aggression onto groups that are disliked, are visible, and are relatively powerless. .

28. The Way We Conform: Normative Rules

29. When Prejudice Is Institutionalized • We call this institutional discrimination or, more specifically, as institutionalized racism and institutionalized sexism.

30. When Prejudice Is Institutionalized Normative Conformity The strong tendency to go along with the group in order to fulfill the group’s expectations and gain acceptance.

31. “Modern” Prejudice

32. Subtle Sexism • Hostile sexists • Benevolent sexists

33. How Can Prejudice Be Reduced? The Contact Hypothesis Mere contact between groups is not sufficient to reduce prejudice. .

34. When Contact Reduces Prejudice:Six Conditions • Mutual interdependence • Common goal • Equal status • Friendly, informal setting • Knowing multiple out-group members • Social norms of equality