Prejudice & Discrimination�Module 4.1

LEARNING TARGETS:

• Explain the group distinctions that tend to elicit prejudice.
• Explain the social, emotional, and cognitive roots of prejudice.

Prejudice

• A Prejudgment - an unjustifiable, usually negative attitude toward a group and its members
• Based on the exaggerated notion that members of other social groups are very different from members of our own social group

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• Usually involves…
• negative feelings
• stereotyped beliefs
• predisposition to discriminatory action

Keep in Mind…

• Racial and ethnic groups are far more alike than they are different
• Any differences that may exist between members of different racial and ethnic groups are far smaller than differences among various members of the same group.

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Categorization

• The tendency to group similar objects
• Our selective attention is drawn to the less-familiar characteristics of minority groups/outgroups
• May be a means to explain stereotypes

Stereotypes

• Because stereotypes sometimes have a kernel of truth, they are easy to confirm, especially when you see only what you expect to see. (confirmation bias & availability heuristic)
• Vivid cases feed stereotypes (9/11 easily remembered so we attach Muslims to terrorism)
• When stereotypic beliefs become expectations that are applied to all members of a given group, they can be both misleading and damaging
• Creating special cases, or exceptions, allows people to maintain stereotypes in the face of contradictory evidence

• A generalized belief about a group of people
• Stereotypes are sometimes accurate but often overgeneralized

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Studying stereotypes

• 3 levels of stereotypes in today’s research
1. Public
• what we say to others about a group
2. Private
• what we consciously think about a group, but don’t say to others
3. Implicit/Subtle
• unconscious mental associations guiding our judgments and actions without our conscious awareness
1. See The Hidden Prejudice video clip (Scientific American Frontiers (7 minutes) – Try it yourself HERE.

Implicit Stereotypes

• Uses priming: subject doesn’t know stereotype is being activated, can’t work to suppress it
• Bargh “Age” study
• have subjects read word lists, some lists include words like “gray,” “Bingo,” and “Florida”
• subjects with “old” word lists walked to elevators significantly more slowly
• “Face” study
• Flash pictures of Black or White face
• Flash a gun or hand tool
• Participants more likely to perceive a tool as a gun when it followed a Black face.

Implicit Stereotypes

• Devine’s automaticity theory
• Stereotypes are so prevalent in our culture that we all hold them
• These stereotypes are automatically activated whenever we come into contact with a person from that group. (Amygdala goes off, you become tense, etc…)
• We have to actively push them back down if we don’t wish to act in a prejudiced way.
• Overcoming prejudice is possible, but takes work
• Remember, consciousness always beats subconscious! Notice your gut and then work to rationally counteract it!

Discrimination

• In social relations, taking action against a group of people because of stereotyped beliefs and feelings of prejudice
• Microaggressions - an instance of indirect, subtle, or unintentional discrimination

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The Effects of Prejudice

• The victims of prejudice often internalize the stereotypes about their group effecting their self image and performance.
• Victims of prejudice have higher incidents of mental & physical health problems.
• Kenneth B. Clark’s – Baby Doll Experiment (watch 3:05-4:37)
• Have things changed? See a modern version of this experiment (2 min).

Ways to “Justify” Injustice

• Just-world bias
• a tendency to believe that life is fair, people get what they deserve and deserve what they get
• it would seem horrible to think that you can be a really good person and bad things could still happen to you

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• Just-world bias leads to “blaming the victim”
• we explain others’ misfortunes as being their fault,
• e.g., she deserved to be mugged, what was she doing in that neighborhood anyway?

Roots of Prejudice

Why does prejudice arise?

The Jane Elliot Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes Experiment

(2:53 - 17:24) (15 minutes total)

Ingroup “Us” vs. Outgroup “Them”

• Ingroup - People with whom one shares a common identity
• Outgroup - Those perceived as different or apart form “us”

Ingroup Bias

• The tendency to favor one’s own group usually at the expense of the outgroup
• We make favorable, positive attributions for behaviors by members of our in-group
• We make unfavorable, negative attributions for behaviors by members of out-groups.
• Evolutionarily – it is better for your survival to belong to a group
• Can lead to Ethnocentrism - belief that one’s own culture or ethnic group is superior to others

Grand Haven

Vs.

Rockford

Good

Vs.

Evil

Scapegoat Theory

• When things go wrong prejudice provides an outlet for anger by simplifying the issue and providing someone to blame
• When things go wrong, we cling to our ingroup and blame the outgroup
• Example: Nazi Germany blaming the Jews for the troubles in Germany after WWI.
• Schadenfreude – secret joy we take in another’s failure

Accounting for Prejudice: �Two Theories

1. Prejudice and intergroup hostility increase when different groups are competing for scarce resources (economic downturns)
2. People are prejudiced against groups that are perceived as threatening important in-group norms and values
• Frustrated people tend to build themselves up by tearing others down.

Major Culture Wars are often the result of Traditional Norms and Values being Threatened.

Cognitive Shortcuts

• Ethnocentrism – assuming the superiority of one’s culture.
• People born into a culture will absorb the values and beliefs of that culture and grow up to believe that their cultural ideals are the norm.

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Eating Crickets

Disgusting or Delicious?

Out-Group Homogeneity Effect �

• Typically, we describe the members of our in-group as being quite varied, despite having enough features in common to belong to the same group
• Causes other-race effect – tendency for us to recall the faces of our own race more accurately than faces from other races (we know what differences to look for)
• We tend to see members of the out-group as much more similar to one another, even in areas that have little to do with the criteria for group membership.
• Our selective attention is drawn toward the features that make less-familiar minorities different form our in-group.

Patricia Devine’s 3-step process to Individual Prejudice Reduction

1. Individuals must decide that prejudiced responses are wrong and consciously reject prejudice and stereotyped thinking
2. They must internalize their nonprejudiced beliefs so that they become an integral part of their personal self-concept
3. Individuals must learn to inhibit automatic prejudicial reactions and deliberately replace them with nonprejudiced responses that are based on their personal standards

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• REMEMBER: It’s what we do with our feelings that matters. By monitoring our feelings and actions, replacing old habits with new, seeking out new friends and experiences, we can free ourselves from prejudice.