Chapter 13 Prejudice Causes and Cures 2004 Pearson

Chapter 13 Prejudice: Causes and Cures © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Chapter Outline I. Prejudice: The Ubiquitous Social Phenomenon © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Prejudice: The Ubiquitous Social Phenomenon Prejudice is extremely powerful and ubiquitous; it affects all of us—majority group members as well as minority. Prejudice is dangerous, fostering negative consequences from lowered self-esteem to torture, murder, and genocide. Although over the past 50 years blatant discrimination has been reduced, it still exists in subtle—and sometimes not-so-subtle—forms. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Chapter Outline II. Prejudice, Stereotyping, and Discrimination Defined © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Prejudice, Stereotyping and Discrimination Defined Prejudice is an attitude. It has the three components of attitudes: i) affective, ii) cognitive, and iii) behavioural. Prejudice is a hostile or negative attitude toward a distinguishable group of people, based solely on their membership in that group. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Prejudice, Stereotyping & Discrimination Defined Prejudice: The Affective Component The affective component is the emotion (e. g. , anger, warmth) associated with the attitude object. Although prejudice refers to either positive or negative affect, people usually reserve the word ‘prejudice’ for use only when it refers to negative attitudes about others. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Prejudice, Stereotyping & Discrimination Defined Stereotyping: The Cognitive Component The cognitive component is our beliefs and thoughts (cognitions) about the target of prejudice. It involves stereotyping. A stereotype is a generalization about a group of people in which identical characteristics are assigned to virtually all members of the group, regardless of actual variation among the members. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Prejudice, Stereotyping & Discrimination Defined Discrimination: The behavioural Component The behavioural component of prejudice refers to the actions, or behaviour, associated with the prejudiced object, such as discrimination. Discrimination is an unjustified, negative, or harmful action towards a member of a group, simply because of his or her membership in that group. Stereotypic beliefs (prejudice) can result in unfair treatment (see Bond et al, 1988, mental hospital study; Fig. 13. 1; also Page, 1998, 1999). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Chapter Outline III. What Causes Prejudice? © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? What makes people prejudiced? Is it inherited, or is it learned? Possibly both. Prejudice could be an essential part of our biological survival mechanism inducing us to favour own family, tribe, or race and to express hostility toward outsiders. Or, our culture (parents, community, media) might intentionally, or unintentionally, instruct us to assign negative qualities and attributes to people who are different from us. No one knows. What is known is that the specifics of prejudice must be learned. How does this happen? © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Think: Social Cognition One way prejudice is learned is as a byproduct of the way we process and organize information—all of the negative aspects of social cognition can lead us to form negative stereotypes and to apply them in a discriminatory fashion. In other words, prejudice is the inevitable byproduct of categorization, schemas, heuristics, and faulty memory processes in processing information. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Think: Social Cognition Schemas (stereotypes) we hold about certain groups influence the way we process information about them. -eg, information consistent with our schemas will be given more attention, will be recalled more often, and will be remembered better than inconsistent information. -eg, we also tend to fill in the blanks with schemaconsistent information__to the anti-Negro person, negroes are musical, athletic, lazy, dumb, regardless of the obvious characteristics of the target person. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Think: Social Cognition Schemas (stereotypes) are highly resistant to change__even in the face of contradictory evidence. -eg, we explain away disconfirming evidence and thereby maintain our stereotypes, ‘Oh he’s an exception. ’ -eg, or we dismiss evidence that might disconfirm our stereotypes. ‘Oh he’s a phony. ’ © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Think: Social Cognition Sometimes the person we encounter may be so contrary to our stereotype that it is impossible to interpret the person’s behaviour in stereotypeconsistent terms. What do we do then? We create a new subcategory of exceptions to the rule (eg, homosexuals who are accountants are not promiscuous), so that the original stereotype remains intact (eg, in general, homosexuals are promiscuous). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Social Categorization: Us vs. Them Another way prejudice is encouraged is through the in-group bias (the us-vs. -them). An in-group is a group with which a person identifies and feels he/she is a member of; an out-group is a group with which a person does not identify. In-group bias is the especially positive feelings and special treatment we reserve for people we have defined as part of our in-group. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Social Categorization: Us vs. Them Out-group members are seen as possessing negative traits and are often disliked. This tendency to favour the in-group while denigrating the out-group is so pervasive that people show this bias even under the most minimal conditions (see Tajfel and colleagues, 1982). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Social Categorization: Us vs. Them Tajfel and colleagues found that randomly formed groups showed this in-group favouritism bias. And Canadian researchers have shown that the tendency to discriminate against the out-group is even stronger when people have chosen their group rather than have been randomly assigned to it (Perreault & Bourhis, 1999). Research at the University of Alberta shows that an in -group can be created simply by photographing people together (Burgess et al, 2000). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Social Categorization: Us vs. Them Why do we show this tendency to favour the in-group while denigrating the out-group? Because, i) Belonging to a group gives us social identity, and ii) Having a social identity contributes to feelings of positive self-esteem. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Social Categorization: Us vs. Them As predicted from in-group bias theory, research shows that: i) the greater the identification with one’s own group, the greater the discrimination against an out-group. ii) when people’s self-esteem is threatened, they are especially likely to denigrate the out-group. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Social Categorization: Us vs. Them Is there a way to minimize the us-vs. -them effect? Yes. Try to foster feelings of a common identity between groups (see research by Clement and colleagues learning the other groups language). To boost our self-esteem in some other domain, so as to negate the need to derogate others for this purpose. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Social Categorization: Us vs. Them Another consequence of social categorization is the out-group homogeneity bias, Out-group homogeneity bias is the perception that those in the out-group are more similar to each other than they really are, as well as more similar than the members of the in-group (see Quattrone & Jones, 1980: Fig. 13. 2). Out-group homogeneity bias has been found in a wide variety of studies in the US, Europe, Australia and Canada. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? What we Believe: Stereotypes The relationship between stereotyping and prejudice is a complex one. One of the complexities is that stereotypes are not activated in every situation. Another is that our attitudes toward members of another group are determined not only by our stereotype of the group, but also by our perception of that group’s stereotype of us. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Activation of Stereotypes Research shows that derogatory comments can activate other negative, stereotypical beliefs about the target person (see Henderson-King & Nisbett, 1996). How does this activation process work? Devine and colleagues have developed a theory about how stereotypical beliefs affect cognitive processing. It is a 2 -stage process (see Fig. 13. 3). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

© 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Activation of Stereotypes Devine’s theory is based on the distinction between automatic and controlled information processing. Automatic processing is when we have no control, i. e. , under certain conditions the stereotypes are automatically triggered, e. g. , ‘Native Canadians are lazy. ’ Controlled processing allows for the suppression of these automatic stereotypes, e. g. , ‘That’s not fair; Native Canadians are no lazier than anyone else. ’ © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Activation of Stereotypes Thus, according to Devine’s theory when we process information about another person, i) first the stereotypes that we know about are automatically triggered, ii) then in the controlled process we decide whether or not to accept the stereotype. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Activation of Stereotypes Not all research results have been consistent with this theory (see kawakami et al, 1998) It is now generally accepted that there is considerable variability in people’s automatic processing of negative stereotypes. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Activation of Stereotypes Fazio et al, (1995) suggest that there are probably three kinds of people: i) Those who do not have an automatic negative reaction to the target person, blacks (ie, low prejudice people); ii) Those who have an automatic negative reaction to blacks but have no qualms about expressing those feelings (ie, people who are willing to be prejudiced); iii) Those who have an automatic negative reaction but want to suppress this reaction. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Activation of Stereotypes We have seen that people often automatically activate stereotypes. Fortunately, research suggest, these effects tend to be rather short-lived (see kunda and colleagues, 2002) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Stereotype Activation and Inhibition Stereotypes can be selectively activated or inhibited, depending on motivational factors such as self-enhancement (see Sinclair & Kunda, 1999 study; Fig. 13. 4). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Meta-Stereotypes Recently, Vorauer et al (1998) raised the possibility that our level of prejudice depends not solely on whether our stereotype of a particular group is positive or negative, but also on whether we think members of that group ascribe to a positive or negative stereotype of us. This is referred to as a meta-stereotype. A meta-stereotype is a person’s beliefs regarding the stereotype that out-group members hold about him/her. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? Meta-Stereotypes For example, studies show that white students at the University of Manitoba believed that Native Canadians perceive white Canadians as prejudiced, unfair, selfish, arrogant, wealthy, materialistic, phony, etc__a meta-stereotype. Moreover, when white students were asked about their reaction to an anticipated interaction with Native students at U of M, the white students felt that they would experience negative emotions and would not enjoy the interaction very much. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Feel: Affect and Mood Esses et al (1993) point out that there is more to prejudice than merely the attribution of stereotypes to groups. Their research suggest that the emotions elicited by a particular group are important in determining our level of prejudice. When we are in a good mood, we are likely to evaluate members of out-groups more favourably than when we are in a bad mood. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Feel: Affect and Mood And, of all of the predictors of prejudice (emotion, stereotypes, symbolic beliefs, and behaviour), emotion is the strongest (Haddock et al, 1993). Recent research by Corenblum and Stephan (2001) suggests that emotion is also a strong predictor of prejudice that minority groups feel toward majority groups. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Feel: Affect and Mood Although studies show that emotion is related to prejudice, it is not clear that there is a causal relationship. Esses and Zanna (1995) set up experiments to test this possibility. They manipulated mood and measured the effect on people’s attitudes. They found that indeed, there is a causal relationship. Participants in a bad mood described various ethnic groups in more negative terms than did those who were in a good mood, or a neutral mood. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Feel: Affect and Mood Esses and Dovidio (2002) found that when white students were shown a videotape of a black man experiencing discrimination in several situations and asked to focus on their feelings about each situation, they felt more positive toward blacks and were more willing to interact with blacks in the future than students who were told to pay attention to their thoughts in this regard. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Feel: Affect and Mood the role of emotion in predicting attitudes may vary depending on the situation (see Oka crisis example). An important implication of this research for reducing prejudice is that intervention programs should focus on how people feel, rather than how they think about discriminatory situations. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Assign Meaning: Attributional Biases Prejudice also stems from our tendency to make dispositional attributions—to leap to the conclusion that a person’s behaviour is due to some aspect of personality rather than to some aspect of the situation. Pettigrew (1979) called this the ultimate attribution error—our tendency to make internal, dispositional attributions for the negative behaviours of outgroup members, and external, situational attributions for their positive behaviours. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Assign Meaning: Attributional Biases The typical gender stereotype of women being inferior to men is maintained by attributional biases. -e. g. , if a man fails on a given task, observers attributed his failure either to bad luck, or to lower effort; if a women failed at the same task, observers felt the task was too hard for her ability level. These effects apply to racial stereotypes as well (see Corenblum et al, 1996 Native children study). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Assign Meaning: Attributional Biases Moreover, if a stereotype is strong enough, even members of the stereotyped group buy into it. -eg, Nichols (1975) found that grade 4 boys attributed their own successful outcome on a difficult IQ task to their ability and blamed their failures on bad luck; whereas -girls tended to derogate their own successful performance and blamed themselves for failures. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Assign Meaning: Attributional Biases Thus, we tend to explain the behaviour of out-group members in a way that perpetuates our stereotype of them, thereby fostering prejudice. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Allocate Resources: Realistic Conflict Theory Realistic conflict theory states that limited resources lead to conflict between groups, and result in increased prejudice and discrimination. A classic study by Sherif et al (1961) tested group conflict theory using the natural environment of a Boy Scout camp, and normal, well-adjusted 12 -yearold boys. They found that competition did indeed produce inter -group conflict, hostility, and prejudice. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Allocate Resources: Realistic Conflict Theory Several historical studies document that discrimination against out-groups covaries with the scarcity of jobs, or other resources. Most notable is a study by Hovland Sears (1940) correlating the price of cotton (a major economic indicator) during the period 1882 -1930, and the number of lynchings of African Americans in the southern U. S. , found a significant negative relationship—as the economic situation worsened the number of lynchings increased. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Allocate Resources: Realistic Conflict Theory In Canada, conflict over scarce resources (eg, lobster) has fuelled racial tension between white and Native fishers in Burnt Church, NB. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Allocate Resources: Realistic Conflict Theory Further, a Canadian study by Palmer (1996) has showed that attitudes towards immigration mirror unemployment rates. -e. g. , between 1975 and 1995, the unemployment rate increased, and with it, so did negative attitudes toward immigration (see Fig. 13. 5). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Allocate Resources: Realistic Conflict Theory The foregoing studies are correlational in nature and do not allow causal conclusions to be drawn. Esses et al (1998) devised a study to test that perceived competition for resources causes unfavourable attitudes toward immigrants. Results showed that perceived competition did lead to more negative attitudes toward the idea of Sandirian (fictitious country) immigration to Canada and toward immigrants, in general. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Conform: Normative Rules A final explanation of what causes prejudice is conformity to normative standards in the society. Normative conformity is the tendency to go along with the group in order to fulfill its expectations and gain acceptance. Pettigrew argues that although economic competition, frustration, and social cognition processes do account for some prejudice, by far the greatest determinant of prejudice is conformity to social norms. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Conform: Normative Rules As the norm swings more toward tolerance for certain out-groups, many people become more careful__outwardly acting unprejudiced, but inwardly maintaining their prejudiced views. This phenomenon is called modern prejudice. Thus, truly prejudiced people may hide their prejudice to avoid social disapproval. This raises an interesting question. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

What Causes Prejudice? The Way We Conform: Normative Rules How do we reduce prejudice in people who aren’t willing to admit that they are prejudiced, or perhaps aren’t even aware that they are prejudiced? Son Hing and colleagues (2002) successfully used hypocrisy induction. Inducing hypocrisy creates feelings of guilt and discomfort, and makes people become aware of attitudes they typically repress. To relieve these negative feelings people change their discriminatory behaviour in a positive direction. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Chapter Outline IV. Individual Differences in Prejudice © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Individual Differences in Prejudice Research confirms that certain kinds of people are especially likely to hold negative attitudes toward members of out-groups. Those who subscribe to just world beliefs, and who are high in right-wing authoritarianism, religious fundamentalism, and social dominance are more likely to be prejudiced against out-groups than those who score low on these dimensions. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Individual Differences in Prejudice Just World Beliefs Just world belief: the view that the world is a fair and just place where people get what they deserve and deserve what they get. Negative attitudes toward the poor and homeless__including blaming them for their own plight__are more prevalent among individuals with strong just world beliefs (Farnham & Gunter, 1984) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Individual Differences in Prejudice Right-Wing Authoritarianism Right-wing authoritarianism is defined in terms of three clusters of attitudes: i) authoritarian submission (a high degree of submission to authority figures) ii)authoritarian aggression (aggression directed toward groups that are seen as legitimate targets by authority figures) iii) conventionalism (a high degree of conformity to the rules and conventions that are established by authority figures) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Individual Differences in Prejudice Right-Wing Authoritarianism Those who score high on right-wing authoritarianism compared to lows, -hold traditional, nonegalitarian attitudes toward women -express more negative attitudes toward French Canadians, Natives, and Pakistanis, and -show especially high levels of prejudice against homosexuals. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Individual Differences in Prejudice Right-Wing Authoritarianism Can the attitudes of right-wing authoritarians be changed? Yes. One strategy that has proven effective is to create awareness that their attitudes toward the target group (eg, homosexuals) are much more negative than other people’s, and they tend to change their attitudes because conforming to social norms is important to them. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Individual Differences in Prejudice Right-Wing Authoritarianism Another way is to encourage interaction with members of the out-group. Altemeyer (2001) found that right-wing authoritarians became more positive in their attitudes toward homosexuals following interaction. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Individual Differences in Prejudice Religious Fundamentalism Religious fundamentalism: a belief in the absolute and literal truth of one’s religious beliefs. Research has shown that people who scored high in religious fundamentalism blamed homosexuals and single mothers (groups who behaviour is seen as immoral by religious fundamentalists) for unfortunate situations (eg, unemployment), whereas groups who were not seen as threatening basic religious values (eg, students) were not blamed to the same extent. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Individual Differences in Prejudice Social Dominance Social dominance orientation: the belief that groups of people are inherently unequal and that it is acceptable for some groups in society to be benefited more than others. Research conducted in Canada, China, Israel, Mexico, New Zealand, Taiwan, and the US has shown that social dominance is associated with racial prejudice, sexism, and negative attitudes toward homosexuals. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Individual Differences in Prejudice Social Dominance Can the attitudes of people high in social dominance be changed? Yes Esses and colleagues (2001) have used an indirect approach (ie, creating a sense of shared identity between the high dominant people and the target of prejudice) to reduce prejudice © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Chapter Outline V. Effects of Stereotyping, Prejudice, and Discrimination © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Effects of Stereotyping, Prejudice and Discrimination Self-Fulfilling Prophecies Stereotyping, prejudice and discrimination can have devastating effects on their victims. Research on self-fulfilling prophecies suggests that we may unknowingly create stereotypical behaviour in out-group members through our treatment of them. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Effects of Stereotyping, Prejudice and Discrimination Self-Fulfilling Prophecies When a member of a majority group mistreats a member of a disadvantaged group, the disadvantaged person is unlikely to perform well, thereby confirming the majority group member’s negative stereotype and perpetuating the discrimination (see Word et al, 1974 interview study; Fig. 13. 6). This is referred to as the self-fulfilling prophecy. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

© 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Effects of Stereotyping, Prejudice and Discrimination Stereotypic Threat Members of an out-group also may experience stereotypic threat. Stereotype threat is the apprehension experienced by members of a minority group that they might behave in a manner that confirms an existing cultural stereotype about their group. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Effects of Stereotyping, Prejudice, and Discrimination Self-Blaming Attributions for Discrimination Finally, there is evidence that victims of discrimination may blame themselves for their poor performance__choosing to forfeit a sense of competence in favour of preserving social acceptance and the perception of control (see Ruggiero & Taylor, 1995 Mc. Gill study; Fig. 13. 7). This pattern may set up a vicious cycle. If minority group members blame themselves for negative outcomes, majority group members are able to justify their ongoing discrimination. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Chapter Outline VI. How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? ‘It’s never too late to give up our prejudices. ’ (Henry David Thoreau) There a number of ways prejudice can be reduced. Some have been mentioned: i) Getting people to focus on positive aspects of themselves (self-affirmation) reduces the need to denigrate others in order to get a self-esteem boost. ii) Blurring the distinction between ‘us’ and ‘them’ can improve attitudes toward out-groups. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Other strategies include: iii) learning not to hate; Iv) revising stereotypical beliefs; v) The contact hypothesis; vi) Cooperation and independence: the jigsaw classroom; vii) The extended contact hypothesis © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Learning Not to Hate Prejudice can also be reduced by having people experience what it is like to be the victim of discrimination (see Jane Elliot, 1977 example). Children may also be effective in teaching one another not to be prejudiced (see Aboud & Doyle, 1996 Quebec study of 3 rd & 4 th grade children). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Revising Stereotypical Beliefs People tend to process information in ways that confirm their stereotypes__even if that information completely contradicts the stereotype. The question arises, What sort of information would actually refute a stereotype? It seems that it depends partly on how the disconfirming information is presented. Weber and Crocker (1983) present 3 possible models. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Revising Stereotypical Beliefs Webber and Crocker proposed three possible models of how stereotypes might change when exposed to disconfirming information: i) The bookkeeping model states that information inconsistent with a stereotype modifies the stereotype. ii) The conversion model states that a strongly salient inconsistent piece of information radically changes the stereotype. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Revising Stereotypical Beliefs iii) The sub-typing model states that information inconsistent with a stereotype that leads to the creation of a new sub-stereotype to accommodate the inconsistent information without changing the initial stereotype. The bookkeeping and sub-typing models are supported by empirical research; the conversion model is not. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? The Contact Hypothesis An especially effective way of reducing prejudice is through contact—bringing in-group and out-group members together, known as the contact hypothesis. Contact must take place, however, only under certain prescribed conditions, otherwise it can exacerbate the existing negative attitudes. There are six such conditions. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? When Contact Reduces Prejudice: Six Conditions Allport suggested that six conditions are necessary for inter-group contact to reduce prejudice: i) Mutual interdependence: a situation in which two or more groups need each other and must depend on each other in order to accomplish a goal that is important to each group. Mutual interdependence is essential for contact to lead to a reduction in prejudice (see Sherif et al, 1961 summer camp study; Fig. 13. 8). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? When Contact Reduces Prejudice: Six Conditions ii) A common goal iii) Equal status of group members iv) Informal interpersonal contact v) Multiple contacts with several members of the out -group vi) Social norms in place that promote equality © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? When Contact Reduces Prejudice: Six Conditions When the above six conditions are met, hostile groups will reduce their stereotyping, prejudice, and discriminatory behaviour (Aronson & Bridgeman, 1979). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Cooperation and Interdependence: The Jigsaw Classroom The jigsaw classroom has been found to be a powerful way to reduce stereotyping and prejudice among children of different ethnicities. A jigsaw classroom is a classroom setting designed to reduce prejudice and raise the self-esteem of children by placing them in small desegregated groups and making each child dependent on the other children in his or her group to learn the course material and do well in the class. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Cooperation and Interdependence: The Jigsaw Classroom Aronson and colleagues gathered data from the jigsaw experiments. Results were: Compared to students in traditional classrooms, students in the jigsaw groups showed a decrease in prejudice and stereotyping, as well as an increase in their liking for their groupmates, both within and across ethnic boundaries. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Cooperation and Interdependence: The Jigsaw Classroom In addition, children in the jigsaw classrooms performed better on objective exams, liked school more, and showed a significantly greater increase in self-esteem than did children in traditional classrooms. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Cooperation and Interdependence: The Jigsaw Classroom Moreover, children in schools where the jigsaw technique was practiced developed a greater ability to empathize with others and showed substantial evidence of true integration. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Cooperation and Interdependence: The Jigsaw Classroom The jigsaw classroom was first tested in 1971. Since then several cooperative techniques have been developed. The extremely positive results have been replicated in thousands of classrooms in the US and in other countries. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? Cooperation and Interdependence: The Jigsaw Classroom And, cooperative learning has become a major force within the field of public education and generally accepted as one of the most effective ways of improving race relations in schools. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? The Extended Contact Hypothesis Under the right conditions, contact between groups can be highly effective in reducing prejudice. But it is not always possible to have members of different groups interact, particularly under the right conditions. Thus, the extended contact hypothesis comes into play © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? The Extended Contact Hypothesis Extended contact hypothesis is the mere knowledge that a member of one’s own group has a close relationship with a member of another group can reduce prejudice toward that group. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? The Extended Contact Hypothesis Wright et al (1997) found support for this extended contact hypothesis They showed that when one of the group members became friends with the ‘enemy, ’ then the remaining group members adopted a more positive attitude toward the out-group, and they became more generous to the out-group when allocating monetary rewards. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Can Prejudice and Discrimination Be Reduced? The Extended Contact Hypothesis Such results are highly encouraging. They suggest that we, alone, can make a difference simply by becoming friends with a member of an out-group. And as members of our group learn about this friendship, they will become less prejudiced toward that group. The End © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.