Not Everybody is "Different-From-Me": Toward a Historico-Cultural Account of Prejudice

Abstract

In this article, the authors critique the assumption that physical difference per se leads to intergroup conflict. Building on the social psychology of WE.B. Du Bois, it is contended that the universalist perspective of mainstream social psychology-which holds that the in-group/out-group bias of European Americans is replicated in African Americans and in other minority groups-reflects the mainstream, White-oriented thinking of North American society in general and North American psychology in particular The authors argue that many mainstream psychologists havefailed to acknowledge the limitations oftheirown sociohistorical circumstances and that what they have treated as universal characteristics has typically been their own limited experience fallaciously generalized. Only by acknowledging the limitations of each group 's perspectives and the sociohistorical background of those perspectives can mainstream psychologists develop inclusive, accurate theories of the personal and interpersonal functioning of persons from diverse backgrounds.