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Social Identity and Empathy for Outgroup Victims of Intergroup Harm

Explore the impact of perspective-taking in cases where the ingroup has harmed the outgroup. Understand how social identity affects empathy, justification of actions, and victim blame. Discover implications for collective action and attitudes towards outgroup victims.

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Social Identity and Empathy for Outgroup Victims of Intergroup Harm

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  1. Social Identity and Empathy for Outgroup Victims of Intergroup Harm Mark Tarrant, Keele University Dirk van Rooy, Australian N.U. Nyla R. Branscombe, University of Kansas Martin S. Hagger, University of Nottingham

  2. Perspective-taking and empathy for outgroup members • Perspective-taking • Batson et al. (1997, 2002): PT and heightened empathy for outgroup member, enhanced caring, and improved attitudes (empathy – attitude: .65) • Empathy and helping (e.g., Stürmer, Snyder, & Omoto, 2005) • Vescio, Sechrist, and Paolucci (2003): higher empathy for racial outgroup and more positive attitudes following PT • A positive message, but what happens in contexts where the ingroup has harmed the outgroup?

  3. Perspective-taking and social identity threat • Value of social identity undermined by being implicated in harming another group • Social identity theory (SIT: Tajfel & Turner, 1979) • Positive ingroup image • PT may further exacerbate social identity threat • Leads ingroup to consider its role in harming outgroup (Mallett et al., in press) • Could lead to a defensive response aimed at protecting identity • Empathy avoidance • Defense of ingroup (victim blame, ingroup support: see Branscombe & Miron, 2004)

  4. Perspective-taking and social identity threat • Mallett et al., (in press, GPIR) • PT can lead to enhanced support for collective action on behalf of outgroup • However, this is least likely when social identity concerns present • Zebel et al., (2002): • PT and lower collective guilt amongst high group identifiers • Given link between empathy and attitudes / pro-social behavior, we were interested in how social identity concerns moderate PT effectiveness

  5. Hypotheses • PT will lead to empathy avoidance when social identity concerns are activated • E.g., when the ingroup, rather than another group, has harmed the outgroup • PT will lead to greater justification of the ingroup’s actions when social identity concerns are activated • i.e., enhanced victim blame, stronger support for ingroup perpetrators of harm

  6. Experiment 1 • White British participants (N = 80) presented with a Muslim employee (outgroup victim) who had been denied promotion by his employer • Threat to identity was manipulated by varying the group membership of the harm-doers • British (ingroup) vs. American (third group) employer

  7. PT manipulation (e.g., Batson et al., 1997) • PT condition: • “Try to imagine how Mr. Mohamed [the victim] feels about what has happened to him and how it has affected his life. Try to feel the full impact of what Mr Mohamed has been through and how he feels as a result” • Objective condition: • “Try to take an objective position towards what happened to Mr. Mohamed. Try not to get caught up in how Mr. Mohamed feels about what has happened to him; just remain objective and detached”

  8. Experiment 1 • Design: 2 (PT) x 2 (perpetrator group membership) between-groups • DVs: • Empathy for victim (3 items): sympathy, compassion, understanding (alpha = .78) • Two justification strategies: • Perpetrator evaluation (6 items): trustworthy, likeable... (alpha = .73) • Victim responsibility (“how responsible was Mr Mohamed for the way he was treated?”)

  9. Experiment 1: Empathy for victim Finteraction (1, 76) = 4.60, p = .04, p² = .04 F(1, 76) = 5.50, p = .02, p² = .07

  10. Experiment 1: Victim responsibility Finteraction (1, 74) = 4.54, p = .04, p² = .06 F(1, 74) = 5.65, p = .02, p² = .07

  11. Experiment 2 • Context change: harm less deniable • British participants (N = 115) shown media photographs depicting abuse of Iraqi prisoners (outgroup members) • Harm-doers depicted as either British (ingroup) or American (third group) army personnel • PT manipulation as before • DVs: Empathy for victims, victim blame, perpetrator evaluation

  12. Experiment 2: Empathy (sympathy) Finteraction (1, 106) = 4.08 p = .05, p² = .04 F (1, 110) = 3.75, p = .055, p² = .03 Warm-hearted F (1, 109) = 4.85, p = .03, p² = .04: PT condition, ingroup < 3rd group

  13. Experiment 2: Perpetrator evaluation F interaction (1, 110) = 3.47, p = .07, p² = .03 F (1, 110) = 5.36, p = .022, p² = .05

  14. Conclusions • While PT can influence empathy and intergroup attitudes, our findings suggest a more complex picture in which PT is influenced by social identity concerns.... • When the ingroup has harmed outgroup members, PT can lead to lower empathy and employment of strategies to justify the harm

  15. Conclusions • If empathy is avoided, attitudes towards the outgroup are unlikely to improve substantially • Empathy likely to be experienced most readily by leading group members to view the ingroup’s behaviour objectively

  16. Acknowledgements • ESRC (RES-000-22-2441)

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