Doddering but dear … even in the eyes of young children? Age stereotyping and prejudice in childhood and adolescence

This study aims to explore age prejudice, and to examine age stereotyping in children and adolescents by adopting the Stereotype Content Model (SCM) as a theoretical framework. It was hypothesised that children are socialised into adopting an ambivalent representation of old age (socialisation hypothesis) and that this cognitive bias becomes weaker in adolescence due to greater cognitive maturity (developmental hypothesis). By analysing representative data from Portugal (European Social Survey; N = 2367), it was ascertained that the ambivalent age stereotype (higher evaluations of warmth than competence for older people) is indeed a shared social representation of older people in Portuguese society. A total of 103 Portuguese children (6–10 year olds) and adolescents (11–15 year olds) were then sampled from a local school and responded to age‐appropriate measures assessing age prejudice as well as age stereotypes. Contrary to previous studies, the findings do not provide evidence for the existence of age prejudice because both children and adolescents reported positive feelings towards older people. However, the socialisation hypothesis was corroborated by showing that the ambivalent old age stereotype was already present in childhood. Contrary to the stipulated developmental hypothesis, the magnitude of this cognitive bias was very similar in adolescence.     

Fear of Infection or Justification of Social Exclusion? The Symbolic Exploitation of the Ebola Epidemic

Public discourse in Western countries on the 2014 Ebola epidemic provided a unique natural opportunity to study the relationship between a disease's sociocultural representation and health policy support. Our main prediction stated that among Western citizens, support for restrictive health policies (e.g., mandatory quarantining) would be determined more through preexisting prejudice towards African immigrants than fears of Ebola infection. A questionnaire study with time‐lagged measurement of predictor and criterion variables employing a German sample (N = 218) that was heterogeneous in terms of gender, age, profession, political orientation, and income level provided clear support for this assumption. Although variables related to fear‐of‐infection were significant predictors, prejudice‐related variables explained several times more variance in participants’ support for restrictive policies. Moreover, the degree to which participants adopted prevalent beliefs regarding the sociocultural origins of Ebola (e.g., eating bushmeat) further intensified the impact of prejudice‐related variables.     

Do maternal stress and home environment mediate the relation between early income‐to‐need and 54‐months attentional abilities?

Using Ecological Systems Theory and stage sequential modelling procedures for detecting mediation, this study examined how early developmental contexts impact preschoolers' performances on a measure of sustained attention and impulse control. Data from 1273 European‐American and African‐American participants in the NICHD Study of Early Child Care were used to identify the potential mediators of the relation between early household income‐to‐need (INR) and 54‐month impulsivity and inattention. Exploratory analyses were also conducted to determine whether the relationships between early income, home environment, parenting stress, and the outcome variables differ for African‐American versus European‐American‐American children. We found modest support for the study hypothesis that 36‐month home environment quality mediated the INR/attention relationship. INR accounted for more home environment score variance and home environment accounted for more Impulsivity score variance for African‐American children. Home environments were related to inattention in the European‐American, but not African‐American, group. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Relationship Between Group Identity and Intergroup Prejudice Is Moderated by Sociostructural Variation1

A theoretical model is developed that predicts a stronger relationship between group identity and intergroup prejudice for majority‐group members compared to minority‐group members. This model takes into consideration the sociostructural characteristics of the groups, the differential functions of group identity for majority versus minority‐group members, and the role of perceived intergroup conflict. The model is tested by examining the magnitude of group identity, perceived conflict, and ethnic prejudice expressed by White Americans, African Americans, and Asian Americans. Predictions derived from the model were largely supported. Theoretical implications are discussed and directions for future research are offered.     

群体身份变换性对老年人印象更新的影响：共同内群体认同的中介作用

群体印象更新对于促进群际和谐具有重要的现实意义。本研究采用最简群体再分类范式, 通过4个实验考察了群体身份变换性对老年人外显与内隐印象更新的影响以及共同内群体认同的中介作用。结果发现, 群体身份变换性不仅改变了对最简外群体的印象评价, 而且也提升了年轻人对自然外群体老年人的外显印象评价, 但内隐印象评价的改变不明显; 共同内群体认同在群体身份变换性影响老年人的外显印象更新中起完全中介作用。这些发现不仅从群体身份变换性的视角进一步丰富和拓展了印象更新领域, 而且为群际互动中的偏见消除提供了最简群体再分类新方法。     

Facets of Right‐Wing Authoritarianism Mediate the Relationship Between Religious Fundamentalism and Attitudes Toward Arabs and African Americans

Since the September 11 terrorist attacks, hate crimes against Arabs have increased in the United States. Despite recent increases in anti‐Arab attitudes, little psychological research has been conducted to understand this prejudice. Across two studies, we tested a theoretical model of Arab and African‐American prejudice. We found the aggression facet of right‐wing authoritarianism mediated the relationship between religious fundamentalism (RF) and prejudice toward Arabs and African Americans. Results are interpreted in light of previous research on cognitive rigidity, RF, and prejudice, and implications are made for political leaders conversing about Arab nations and peoples.     

Imagined contact as a prejudice‐reduction intervention in schools: the underlying role of similarity and attitudes

The present research tested a prejudice‐reduction intervention based on imagined contact. White children imagined interacting with a child from an ethnic out‐group (Asian) once a week for 3 weeks, or did not take part in this activity (control group). Compared with the control group, children who engaged in imagined contact subsequently showed more positive attitudes, greater perceived similarity, and willingness for intergroup contact. The effect of the intervention on willingness for contact was mediated by positive attitude change. Implications for imagined‐contact theory and the development of prejudice‐reduction techniques for schools are discussed.     

To Love or Hate Thy Neighbor: The Role of Authoritarianism and Traditionalism in Explaining the Link Between Fundamentalism and Racial Prejudice

Fundamentalism is consistently related to racial prejudice (Hall, Matz, & Wood, 2010), yet the mechanisms for this relationship are unclear. We identify two core values of fundamentalism, authoritarianism and traditionalism, that independently contribute to the fundamentalism‐racial prejudice relationship. We also contextualize the fundamentalism‐racial prejudice relationship by suggesting that fundamentalists may show prejudice based on conceptions of African Americans as violating values but show tolerance when prejudice is less justifiable. These ideas are tested and confirmed using three data sets from the American National Election Studies. Across all three samples, fundamentalism is related to increases in symbolic racism but decreases in negative affect towards African Americans, and these relationships are mediated by both authoritarianism and traditionalism.     

Do the “Eyes” Have It? A Program Evaluation of Jane Elliott's “Blue‐Eyes/Brown‐Eyes” Diversity Training Exercise1

The effectiveness of Jane Elliott's well‐known “blue‐eyes/brown‐eyes” exercise in reducing college students’ stereotyping and prejudice was assessed. College students were randomly assigned to either the exercise group or a comparison group. Blue‐eyed and brown‐eyed exercise participants were given discriminatory versus preferential treatment, respectively; a procedure purportedly designed to sensitize participants to the emotional and behavioral consequences of discrimination. Participation in the exercise was found to be associated with White students (a) indicating significantly more positive attitudes toward Asian American and Latino/Latina individuals, but only marginally more positive attitudes toward African American individuals; and (b) reporting anger with themselves when noticing themselves engaging in prejudiced thoughts or actions—negative affect that theoretically could prove to be either helpful or detrimental in promoting long‐term reduction of stereotyping and prejudice.     

Beliefs About the Disconfirmability of Stereotypes: The Stereotype Disconfirmability Effect1

Two studies examined people's beliefs about the relative disconfirmability of out‐group and in‐group stereotypes. In Study 1 (n= 56), Hispanics and White non‐Hispanics judged the in‐group and out‐group stereotypes in terms of the ease with which they could be dis‐confirmed. The results indicated that strongly, ethnically identified participants believed the out‐group stereotype to be more difficult to disconfirm than the in‐group stereotype. The second study with 73 White participants examined their beliefs about the disconfirmability of the White and African American stereotypes. The results indicated that participants higher in prejudice believed the African American stereotype is more difficult to disconfirm than the White stereotype to a greater degree than participants lower in prejudice. The results suggest that disconfirmability beliefs comprise a distinct construct thai may contribute to the difficulty of changing out‐group stereotypes.     

Racism or Sexism? Attributional Ambiguity and Simultaneous Membership in Multiple Oppressed Groups1

This study examines short‐term psychological effects of prejudice attributions on African American women. Black female college students (N= 112) imagined themselves in an audiotaped scenario in which White male students made negative evaluations of them. Participants completed self‐report measures of psychological stress and state self‐esteem after they rated the likely contributions of various causal attributions to the negative evaluations. Attributions included personal characteristics of the participant and classmates, as well as 3 kinds of prejudice: racism, sexism, and ethgender prejudice (the interaction of racism and sexism). Attributions to racism and ethgender prejudice predicted increased stress and decreased state social self‐esteem. Results contradict assertions that prejudice attributions are self‐protective and imply that prejudice might involve internal and external causal dimensions.     

Child‐Centered Group Play Therapy With African American Boys at the Elementary School Level

Culturally sensitive counseling interventions are needed for African American boys in elementary school. Two important components of counseling African American boys are honoring the African worldview and building self‐confidence. Child‐centered group play therapy is a common intervention for elementary school children. In this article, the authors describe how child‐centered group play therapy with African American boys at the elementary school level honors the African worldview and facilitates their self‐confidence. Counseling implications and recommendations for research are discussed.     

Do You See What I See? Effects of Group Consciousness on African American Women's Attributions to Prejudice

This study examined the effects of three types of group consciousness among African American women ( ethnic , feminist , and womanist ) on prejudice attributions and appraised personal significance ( centrality ) of a negative intergroup event. African American female college students  ( N = 123)  imagined themselves in an audiotaped scenario in which they overheard two European American male classmates make negative evaluations of them. The scenario provided no cause for the negative evaluations and no references to race or gender. Multiple regression analyses revealed that higher ethnic and womanist consciousness were related to increased prejudice attributions and greater centrality appraisals  ( p  <.05)  , while feminism had no effect. Results suggest that womanist consciousness may be more relevant than traditional feminist consciousness in predicting African American women's perceptions of prejudice.     

How does social essentialism affect the development of inter‐group relations?

Psychological essentialism is a pervasive conceptual bias to view categories as reflecting something deep, stable, and informative about their members. Scholars from diverse disciplines have long theorized that psychological essentialism has negative ramifications for inter‐group relations, yet little previous empirical work has experimentally tested the social implications of essentialist beliefs. Three studies (N = 127, ages 4.5–6) found that experimentally inducing essentialist beliefs about a novel social category led children to share fewer resources with category members, but did not lead to the out‐group dislike that defines social prejudice. These findings indicate that essentialism negatively influences some key components of inter‐group relations, but does not lead directly to the development of prejudice.     

Recategorization and subgroup identification: predicting and preventing threats from common ingroups

Much work has supported the idea that recategorization of ingroups and outgroups into a superordinate category can have beneficial effects for intergroup relations. Recently, however, increases in bias following recategorization have been observed in some contexts. It is argued that such unwanted consequences of recategorization will only be apparent for perceivers who are highly committed to their ingroup subgroups. In Experiments 1 to 3, the authors observed, on both explicit and implicit measures, that an increase in bias following recategorization occurred only for high subgroup identifiers. In Experiment 4, it was found that maintaining the salience of subgroups within a recategorized superordinate group averted this increase in bias for high identifiers and led overall to the lowest levels of bias. These findings are discussed in the context of recent work on the Common Ingroup Identity Model.     

The structure of prejudice: associative strength as a determinant of stereotype endorsement

Previous research obtained inconsistent findings as to whether implicit and explicit measures of prejudice are related. According to our view, some of these inconsistencies are due to whether implicit measures assess exclusively the strength of association between the social category and the evaluation or the activation of the social category in addition. Derived from recent theorizing we suggest that it is especially associative strength between the social category and its evaluation that determines the endorsement of prejudice assessed in explicit measures. To test this assumption we used the Implicit Association Test (IAT) to assess the associative strength of German students' prejudice towards Turkish people and the Blatant‐and‐Subtle‐Prejudice‐Scale (BS scale) as an explicit measure of prejudice. We obtained evidence for prejudice at a relative level in that the category of Turks was more closely associated with a negative evaluation and the category of Germans more closely associated with a positive evaluation. In line with our assumptions the implicit measure was correlated with the explicit measure in that the stronger the representation of Turks was associated with a negative evaluation the more prejudiced individuals responded in the explicit prejudice measure. Using a trait assignment technique, we found that neither associative strength nor the endorsement of the prejudice in the explicit measure were related to the contents of the stereotype. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Changing categorization of self can change emotions about outgroups

Drawing on Intergroup Emotions Theory [Mackie, D. M., Maitner, A. T., & Smith, E. R. (in press). Intergroup emotions theory. In T.D. Nelson (Ed.), Handbook of Prejudice, Stereotyping, and Discrimination, New York: Erlbaum.], we propose that a perceiver’s emotional reactions toward other social groups can change in response to situationally induced shifts in self-categorization. American students were led to self-categorize as Americans or as students and reported their anger and respect towards Muslims and police. Results indicated that in reaction to Muslims, participants felt more anger and less respect when categorized as Americans than when categorized as students. In reaction to police, participants felt less anger and more respect when categorized as Americans than when categorized as students. These results support and extend IET, and suggest that in addition to prejudice reduction interventions that focus on recategorization of the target, perceiver recategorization of the self is a viable means of changing emotional reactions to social targets.     

Are members of low status groups perceived as bad, or badly off? Egalitarian negative associations and automatic prejudice

Three studies explored the hypothesis that implicit measures of prejudice can tap negative, yet egalitarian associations. In Study 1, automatically associating African Americans with oppression predicted greater automatic prejudice. In Studies 2 and 3, classically conditioning associations between the novel group Noffians and words like oppressed, maltreated, and victimized led to greater automatic prejudice against Noffians. Results suggest that White Americans’ negative automatic associations with African Americans may partly result from associating members of low status groups with unfair circumstances. Because automatic associations predict prejudiced behaviors, the burden of proof is on those wishing to argue that egalitarian negative associations complicate the assessment of automatic attitudes rather than contribute to prejudiced responses. Discussion focuses on the implications of egalitarian negative associations for the theory and measurement of automatic prejudice.     

Generalized and specific components of prejudice: The decomposition of intergroup context effects

Although different types of prejudice tend to be highly correlated, target‐specific and more generalized components can nevertheless be distinguished. Here, we analyze whether indicators of the intergroup context—threat, contact, and neighborhood composition—predict the target‐specific and/or generalized components of prejudice. Using data from the New Zealand Attitudes and Values Study (N = 4629), we build a multilevel model that captures the relationship between social dominance orientation, general levels of neighborhood heterogeneity, symbolic and realistic threat and cross‐group friendship (averaged across target groups), and generalized prejudice. Our model simultaneously estimates the relationship between target‐specific levels of these intergroup context indicators and target‐specific prejudice. Results indicated that social dominance orientation remained the strongest predictor of generalized prejudice when adjusting for other variables and that indicators of the intergroup context primarily explain differences between target group ratings. Aggregate levels of cross‐group friendship also had a small effect on generalized prejudice.     

Modifying perceived variability: four laboratory and field experiments show the effectiveness of a ready‐to‐be‐used prejudice intervention

We examined whether increasing individuals' perceived variability of an out‐group reduces prejudice and discrimination toward members of this group. In a series of four laboratory and field experiments, we attracted participants' attention to the heterogeneity of members of an out‐group (or not), and then measured their attitudes or behaviors. Perceived variability was manipulated by portraying the out‐group members as having diverse socio‐demographic characteristics and different personality traits and preferences. Prejudice and discrimination were measured in terms of self‐reported prejudice, stereotyping, in‐group bias, social distance, and willingness to do something for the minority group under consideration. In all experiments, perceived variability decreased prejudice and discrimination.