Americans’ Perceptions of Commitment to Strong Families Across Race and Ethnic Groups

Abstract

Theories of prejudice examining perceptual differences of in-groups and out-groups, such as social dominance and group threat perspectives, have found them to be important in generating hegemonic identity formations. This study uses data from the General Social Surveys to explore how these hegemonic group perceptions influence attitudes toward stronger families using race and ethnic groups as proxy measures where Whites are considered the in-group. A modified ecosystemic-interactionist approach along with elements from group threat and social dominance theories as support was used to investigate the underlying premise that group membership influenced respondents’ perceptions of their own family vis á vis others. Overall, the study found support for the underlying premise that membership influenced group perceptions, group knowledge, and group beliefs about commitment to strong families. Additionally, these findings suggest that groups develop most of their beliefs and subsequently their attitudes from limited interaction with those they perceived to be in the out-groups. Other social factors, including media portrayals, geographic propinquity, and education, also play a role in group perceptions, group knowledge, and group beliefs about commitment toward strong families. They support the social dominance and group threat theories that give rise to hegemonic structure within the United States.