Transparency of Self-Report Racial Attitude Scales

Researchers frequently use self-report prejudice scales to assess predictors and outcomes. Responding to evidence that such instruments are vulnerable to social desirability pressures and diverge from implicit attitude measures, researchers have developed instruments intended to be less transparent in their social implications. The purpose of this study was to assess the transparency of a sample of such instruments. Participants completed prejudice measures under typical scale instructions, or under alternate instructions to portray themselves either positively or negatively. The results indicate that several common measures of prejudice are quite transparent in their implications. Further, mean scores of participants instructed to provide desirable responses were indistinguishable from those ostensibly responding honestly.     

The Impact of Race,Racial Attitude,and Gender on Reactions to the Criminal Trial of O. J. Simpson1

Opinions about the criminal trial of O. J. Simpson, as well as general racial attitude, were assessed in different samples of African Americans and Whites in three studies: during jury selection (Study 1), after closing arguments (Study 2), and after the jury verdict was reached (Study 3). We assessed the effects of respondent race, gender, and general racial attitude on case opinion factors and guilt judgments at each point in time. Race was strongly related to case opinions and guilt judgments in all three studies. Racial attitude related significantly to guilt judgments only in Study 1 for Blacks and in Study 3 for Whites. Guilt judgments of Whites were more strongly predicted by the case opinion factors than were those of African Americans. General racial attitudes and opinions about the criminal justice system were more positive for Blacks in Studies 2 and 3, while they did not differ across studies for Whites. A hindsight bias was found for Whites but not for African Americans. Race had a more powerful impact than did gender. Across-study comparison suggested that very few respondents changed their views appreciably over the year-long trial.     

Applicant Race, Job Status, and Racial Attitude as Predictors of Employment Discrimination

It is important to understand why biased employee selection occurs in the workplace. We examined applicant race, job status, and the evaluator's attitudes toward blacks as possible predictors of unfair selection decisions. After completing an attitude toward blacks scale, one hundred and eighty-one people evaluated the qualifications of either a black or white applicant for either a high or low status job. Results showed no differences in the hiring decision. However, evaluators with more negative attitudes toward blacks reported greater confidence in their decision to hire the black applicant than the white applicant for the low status job compared to the confidence of evaluators with more positive attitudes. They also reported greater confidence in their decision to hire the white applicant than the black applicant for the high status job as compared to evaluators with more positive attitudes towards blacks. We observed the opposite results for less biased individuals. Evaluator ratings do not explain these findings. These data suggest that unfair discrimination may operate in subtle ways.     

Reliability of a modified People of Color Racial Identity Attitude Scale and a White Racial Identity Attitude Scale for a sample of master's counseling students

The reliabilities of Helms' People of Color Racial Identity Attitude Scale and White Racial Identity Attitude Scale when used with a sample of master's counseling students were explored for modified versions. Reliabilities were assessed using Cronbach alpha as a measure of internal consistency, and temporal stabilities were measured. Results were consistent with previous findings, with coefficients alpha ranging from .67 to .77 for the modified People of Color Racial Identity Attitude Scale, and from .36 to .84 for the modified White Racial Identity Attitude Scale. Analyses also identified items that may suppress internal consistencies in responding by this sample.     

The Effects of Prior Attitudes and Attitude Importance on Attitude Change and Class Impact in Women's and Gender Studies1

Attitude change in women's and gender studies (WGS) students has been a central goal of the WGS movement since its inception. Attitude change theory stresses the crucial roles of prior attitudes and attitude importance in the effectiveness of a persuasive message. This study examined attitude change dynamics in 548 WGS students drawn from 32 United States college campuses. Results provided partial support for the following hypotheses: (a) Students with attitudes discrepant from the WGS message demonstrate more resistance to attitude change when they deem these attitudes to be more important, and (b) WGS class impact is greater among students who rate class‐relevant attitudes as more important.     

Improving Intergroup Relations: The Effects of Empathy on Racial Attitudes1

Prior research indicates that information‐based intergroup relations programs are only moderately successful (MGregor, 1993; Stephan & Stephan, 1984). In order to explore a means of increasing the effectiveness of techniques used to change attitudes toward out groups, the current study examined the effects of giving Anglo American students information about everyday incidents of discrimination against African Americans either with or without empathy‐inducing instructions. The results indicate that reading about discrimination against African Americans or inducing empathy reduces in‐group‐out‐group bias in attitudes toward African Americans vs. Anglo Americans. The implications of these findings for models of the effects of empathy on intergroup relations are discussed.     

Racial Self-Identification: The Effects of Social History and Gender1

Dark and Clark's pioneering study in 1947 demonstrated that Black children were ambivalent about racial self-identification. Subsequent research indicates that during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, Black children were increasingly likely to demonstrate a commitment to identifying with a Black stimulus. The present study investigates the extent to which this trend persists in the 1980s and how gender of the child affects her/his racial identification. The results indicate that the 1980s may be a time in history when Black children are growing more ambivalent about racial self-identification, and that Black boys are significantly more likely than Black girls to identify with the white doll. The findings suggest that the current political climate which places Blacks at a significant social and economic disadvantage may reduce children's willingness to identify with a Black stimulus. The gender differences are explored in terms of Black boys' greater likelihood psychologically to try to identify away from Blackness.     

Values,Beliefs, and Proenvironmental Action: Attitude Formation Toward Emergent Attitude Objects1

Discoveries in environmental science become the raw material for constructing social attitude objects, individual attitudes, and broad public concerns. We explored a model in which individuals construct attitudes to new or emergent attitude objects by referencing personal values and beliefs about the consequences of the objects for their values. We found that a subset of the major clusters identified in value theory is associated with willingness to take proenvironmental action; that a biospheric value orientation cannot yet be discerned in a general population sample; that willingness to take proenvironmental action is a function of both values and beliefs, with values also predicting beliefs; and that gender differences can be attributed to both beliefs and values. Our model has promise for explicating the factors determining public concern with environmental conditions.     

Effects of Race,Racial Identity Development,and Orientation Style on Perceived Consultant Effectiveness

This study explores Black teachers' preferences for and ratings of consultant effectiveness as a function of consultant race, consultant style, and teacher stage of racial identity development. No significant differences were noted in preferences for either a same- or opposite-race consultant. Participants preferred and rated as more effective an instrumentally oriented consultant.     

Racial Attitudes and the Death Penalty1

This study investigated the relationship between overt and subtle forms of racism with Whites' recommendations for capital sentencing of Black and White offenders convicted of murder. White participants (n= 104) viewed 5 other “jurors” (all Whites or 4 Whites and 1 Black) on videotape individually presenting their decisions to vote for the death penalty in the case. It was hypothesized that the bias of high prejudice-scoring participants would be overt, but that the pattern for low prejudice-scoring participants would be more complex. As predicted, among high prejudice-scoring participants, Black defendants received stronger recommendations for the death penalty than did White defendants. Among low prejudice-scoring White participants, Black offenders received stronger recommendations for the death penalty only when a Black juror advocated the death penalty.     

AMPing Racial Attitudes: Comparing the Power of Explicit and Implicit Racism Measures in 2008

In 2008, ANES included for the first time—along with standard explicit measures of old‐fashioned and symbolic racism—the Affect Misattribution Procedure (AMP), a relatively new implicit measure of racial attitudes. This article examines the extent to which four different measures of racial prejudice (three explicit and one implicit) predict public opinion during and after the 2008 election, including Americans' views towards several racial policy issues, their evaluations of, and feelings toward, Barack Obama, and their attitudes toward a Black president in general. Oversamples of African American and Latino respondents in the 2008 ANES enable us to broaden our tests of these measures beyond traditional White samples. We find that racial prejudice played an important role for all racial/ethnic groups but that the traditional explicit measures of racism are by far the stronger predictors for all of our dependent variables (compared to the new implicit measure) for both White and Black respondents. Surprisingly, the AMP adds clear explanatory power only to models in the Latino sample.     

“鸡尾酒会”环境中的知觉线索的去掩蔽作用

在有多人同时说话的嘈杂环境中,为什么具有正常听力的人能在一定的程度上听懂目标语句？研究这个著名的“鸡尾酒会”问题的一个新进展是将干扰言语的作用区分出了能量掩蔽和信息掩蔽两种成分。与发生在外周系统的能量掩蔽不同,信息掩蔽发生在心理层次并受到认知过程的调节。因此,主观空间分离、与目标语句节奏相关的视觉信号以及对目标语句某些特征的熟悉程度等知觉线索都具有去掩蔽作用。考察可减少信息掩蔽的知觉线索的交互作用及其高级认知调节是今后重要的研究内容     

Sermons on Racial Tolerance and the Parish Neighborhood Context1

A study was conducted concerning racial attitudes of a group of white, Roman Catholic residents of a large midwestern city interviewed before and after they heard two sermons opposing raeial injustice and segregation. There was no significant relationship between presermon and postsermon change in a parishioner's attitude toward racial integration and the prointegration intensity of the sermons he heard. However, variation in the prointegration intensity of sermons delivered in a parish was closely related to the socioeconomic status of the parishioners, suggesting that the priests’perception of parish norms may have influenced the contents of the sermons. The needs or functions that segregationist attitudes may serve were considered. The 3 strongest of 14 correlates of segregationist attitudes investigated in this study were (a) belief that racial integration leads to neighborhood deterioration, (b) authoritarian aggression, and (c) perception of neighbors’attitudes toward integration. These three correlates appear to reflect object appraisal needs, externalization of inner conflict needs, and social adjustment needs, respectively.     

Energetic, Informational, and Triggering Causes

There are three main kinds of causal connections between two events: the transfer of energy, the transfer of information and the triggering of the transfer of one of them or both. There are also other kinds of causal connections. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

科学研究中的非预期事件与态度改变

本文针对高新技术迅猛发展过程中出现的非预期事件 ,围绕潜在的负面效应及其影响范围展开系统分析 ,同时以态度干扰技术穿插于原始态度测量与结果态度测量 (SD方法 )之间 ,探讨、分析科学研究中的重大突发性事件 (克隆绵羊 )对大学生科技态度的负面影响。分析结果发现各类被试对生物技术的态度均出现显著性的变化 ,由较积极、赞同的方向向较消极、中立方向发生态度改变。论文在借鉴同类研究的基础上 ,尝试应用免疫理论等作为对策性建议。     

The Effects of Censorship on Attitude Change: The Influence of Censor and Communication Characteristics1

The effects of censor characteristics and audiences' initial agreement with a censored communication on attitude change and desire to hear a communication were investigated. Subjects were informed that a communication taking a position with which they had originally agreed or disagreed had been censored. The censor was either an attractive or unattractive agent and his expertise on the topic of the speech was either high or low. The results indicated that in all cases except one, censorship led to an increased desire to hear the communication and attitude change toward the position of the communication. In the one exceptional case, when an attractive expert censor forbade a communication with which the audience disagreed, the subjects decreased their desire to hear the speech and did not change their attitudes on the topic of the communication. The results were interpreted as indicating that censorship arouses both reactance and balancing attempts but that balancing will be observed only in limited situations.     

Belief,Affect, and Attitude: Alternative Models of the Determinants of Attitude

A recent debate in the Journal of Consumer Psychology illustrates many of the unresolved issues concerning the development and application of models to predict attitude. A central issue in the debate is whether a noncognitive factor, such as affect, may exert a direct influence on attitude, or whether its influence is mediated by the cognitive structure. We describe the results of two studies designed to determine (a) whether affect and attitude are separate constructs and (b) whether affect influences attitude independently of cognitive structure. The studies address the methodological criticisms levied against previous research and provide results to indicate that affect does influence attitudes directly and independently of cognitive structure.