Effects Of Intergroup Contact Research Articles

Intergroup contact through online comments: Effects of direct and extended contact on outgroup attitudes

This study contributes to the still limited evidence on the effects of online intergroup contact. We conceptualize online contact as occurring through users’ comments online, an easy and accessible venue for intergroup encounters. We test two forms of online contact: encountering an outgroup member directly (direct online contact) or through an ingroup member (extended online contact) and their effects on outgroup attitudes, here various forms of threat and social distance. We also examine the emotional mechanisms through which these effects emerge. We rely on an online experiment (N = 396) testing online contact with two distinct outgroups, an undocumented immigrant or a gay person. Compared to the control, direct online contact decreased perceived threat and social distance toward gays and lesbians, but not toward undocumented immigrants. Direct online contact improved attitudes toward both outgroups through positive and negative emotions, whereas extended online contact reduced negative emotions, improving attitudes towards undocumented immigrants. We discuss theoretical, methodological and practical implications of these findings.

Does terror defeat contact? Intergroup contact and prejudice toward Muslims before and after the London bombings.

Allport (1954) proposed a series of preconditions that have subsequently been shown to facilitate effects of intergroup contact on attitudes toward outgroups (Pettigrew & Tropp, 2006). The present study examines whether objective threat, in the form of the 2005 London 7/7 terror attack, can inhibit the positive effects of contact. We tested hypotheses that contact would affect prejudice toward Muslims regardless of the bombings (contact prevails) or that the bombings would inhibit the effects of contact on prejudice (threat inhibits). Data were collected through representative national surveys 1 month before and again 1 month after the attacks in London on July 7, 2005 (pre-7/7 N = 931; post-7/7 N = 1,100), which represent relatively low and relatively high salience of “objective threat.” Prejudice against Muslims significantly increased following the bombings. Psychological threats to safety (safety threat) and to customs (symbolic threat) mediated the impact of the bombings on prejudice, whereas perceived economic threat did not. All 3 types of psychological threat mediated between contact and prejudice. Multigroup structural equation modeling showed that, even though the objective threat did raise levels of psychological threats, the positive effects of contact on prejudice through perceived psychological threats persisted. Results therefore support a contact prevails hypothesis.

The "Wallpaper Effect" Revisited: Divergent Findings on the Effects of Intergroup Contact on Attitudes in Diverse Versus Nondiverse Contexts.

This article reexamines the so-called "wallpaper effect" of intergroup contact, which contends that for minority group members living in areas more densely populated by majority group members, intergroup contact fails to reduce prejudice. We tested this claim in five studies, using data from five countries, two types of contexts, a range of measures, and involving different minority versus majority groups. Using multilevel cross-level interaction models, we considered whether effects of contact on outgroup attitudes were moderated by relative outgroup size. Results failed to replicate the previously reported findings, revealing, by and large, nonsignificant cross-level moderation effects; instead, we witnessed consistent positive contact effects on attitudes. Findings are discussed against the backdrop of recent research on the consequences of diversity, as well as context-based considerations regarding minority versus majority constellations. We also discuss some exceptions to our findings that emerged for some respondent groups and contexts across the five studies.

Neighborhood Effects of Intergroup Contact on Change in Youth Intergroup Bias.

Intergroup contact plays a critical role in the reduction of prejudice; however, there is limited research examining the multiple ways through which contact can impact trajectories of development for adolescents in divided societies. Thus, the goal of the current study was to examine individual- and context-level effects of intergroup contact on change in intergroup bias through adolescence. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to analyze five waves of data from 933 youth (M age = 15.5, SD = 4.03; range: 10-20 years old; 52% female) living in 38 neighborhoods in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The results suggest that youth increase in bias with age. Adolescents with more frequent intergroup contact increase more quickly, and those who report higher quality of contact increase more slowly. Both frequency and quality of contact at the neighborhood level predicted slower increases in bias across adolescence. The results add to a growing literature that combines social and developmental approaches to understanding how intergroup processes and intergroup divide impact youth development of intergroup attitudes and behaviors. The results are discussed in terms of the importance of both individual experiences and the context of intergroup contact for youth development in divided contexts.

Can stateways change folkways? Longitudinal tests of the interactive effects of intergroup contact and categorization on prejudice

This research examined how a predictable change in the social structure over time (from segregated to integrated) can affect the way intergroup contact and subjective categorization of ingroup and outgroup members (intergroup, superordinate, dual identity) impact on intergroup bias. A three-stage longitudinal study was conducted with six-month intervals (Ns=708, 435, 418) involving high school students in Germany. Time 1 (T1) was characterized by structural segregation and Times 2 and 3 (T2, T3) by structural integration. Longitudinal analysis between T1 and T2 showed that intergroup categorization (but not superordinate categorization or dual identity) improved intergroup relations. Between T2 and T3, dual identity reduced intergroup bias and marginally increased interpersonal closeness whereas superordinate categorization increased bias and reduced interpersonal closeness. There were no effects of intergroup categorization between T2 and T3. Overall, positive effects of contact increased over time, reaching significance from T2 to T3, supporting a consolidation hypothesis and intergroup contact theory more widely. These findings are also consistent with a congruence hypothesis that the impact of intergroup contact is partly determined by the match between how people categorize ingroup and outgroup members and the social structure that frames intergroup relations.

National Identification Counteracts the Sedative Effect of Positive Intergroup Contact on Ethnic Activism.

Positive intergroup contact with socially and economically advantaged national majorities has been shown to reduce ethnic identification among minorities, thereby undermining ethnic minority activism. This finding implies that ethnic identity is the relevant social identity driving ethnic minorities’ struggle for equality. We argue that the study of the “sedating” effect of positive intergroup contact for minorities should be more nuanced. The existence of multiple and sometimes interplaying social identities can foster a reinterpretation of the meaning of “ethnic” activism. This study therefore examines how the interplay of ethnic and national identities shapes the sedating effect of contact on minority activism. We expect national identification to buffer the sedated activism resulting from reduced ethnic identification. That is, the mediation from intergroup contact to reduced ethnic activism through weakened ethnic identification is expected to be moderated by national identification. With survey data from Bulgaria, we investigated support for ethnic activism among Bulgarian Roma (N = 320) as a function of their contact with the national majority as well as their degree of ethnic and national identification. The predicted moderated mediation was revealed: a negative indirect relationship between contact and activism through decreased ethnic identification occurred among Roma with low national identification, whereas no sedating effect occurred among Roma identifying strongly as members of the Bulgarian nation. We discuss the meaning of national identification for the Roma minority, who experience harsh discrimination in countries where they have been historically settled, as well as convergence of these findings with work on dual identification. We highlight the role of interacting social identities in mobilizing resources for activism and the importance of adopting a critical view on ethnic discourse when studying activism in both traditional and immigrant minorities.

How positive and negative contact relate to attitudes towards Roma: Comparing majority and high‐status minority perspectives

AbstractIntergroup contact scholars have recently called for analyzing the effects of negative intergroup contact. In response to this call, we examined the correlates of positive and negative contact with one of the most stigmatized ethnic minorities, that is, Roma. We conducted a study in Bulgaria considering the point of view of the ethnic Bulgarian majority (n = 516) and of Bulgarian Turks (n = 274), an ethnic minority with higher status compared to Roma. Regression analyses showed that positive contact was associated with reduced prejudice and more support for pro‐Roma policies, while negative contact revealed the opposite pattern. These associations did not differ between ethnic Bulgarians and Bulgarian Turks. Moreover, positive and negative intergroup emotions mediated the relationships between positive and negative contact on the one hand and prejudice and policy support on the other. Our study highlights the importance of emotional processes involved in positive and negative intergroup contact experiences and encourages future research to analyze how absolute versus relative status differences shape the effects of positive and negative contact in complex hierarchical societies.

Can Interethnic Friends Buffer for the Prejudice Increasing Effect of Negative Interethnic Contact? A Longitudinal Study of Adolescents in the Netherlands

This study examined interethnic prejudice among 4,238 secondary school pupils in the Netherlands. It builds upon previous research in two ways. First, it advances our understanding of the interplay between positive and negative intergroup contact experiences by testing whether positive intergroup contact serves as a buffer for the prejudice-enhancing effect of negative intergroup contact, as well as the other way around. Secondly, by using longitudinal data, it provides a stricter test of the relationship between negative contact and prejudice among adolescents. Hybrid models with two-wave panel data showed that the transition from having no friends from an ethnic outgroup to having a share of friends from an ethnic outgroup results in lower interethnic prejudice, both for Dutch majority and minority group pupils. Furthermore, we found the transition from having no foes to having one or more foes from an ethnic outgroup to be associated with higher levels of prejudice. We did not find evidence for buffering effects of intergroup contact.

Attitudes towards Interprofessional Education among Medical and Nursing Students: the Role of Professional Identification and Intergroup Contact

This research analyses the effect of professional identification and intergroup contact on attitudes towards interprofessional education (IPE) among medical and nursing students. Three hundred fifty-eight nursing and medical students were surveyed measuring attitudes towards IPE and professional identification. Moreover, students were asked to report the hours of practical training that they had already done, as measure of intergroup contact. Results indicated that ingroup identification increased attitude towards IPE among nursing students, while it decreased attitude among medical students. Intergroup contact, instead, had not significant effect. Results are discussed on the basis of social identity theory and status differences between professional groups.

Impact of Multicultural Environment of Islamic Educational Institutes on Students’ Acculturation

The study focuses on the effect of exposure to Multicultural and international environment of an Islamic educational institution on the acculturation of its students. Acculturation has been used in this study with a wide sense of meaning that underscores the sense of co-existence and feeling of unity. The analysis puts forth many studies that show the positive effects of intergroup contact between groups of diverse ethnic backgrounds and cultural heritages in reducing prejudice and negative stereotyping towards the out-group. This study investigated whether the Internationalization process of the International Islamic University, Malaysia, with intergroup contact taking place under optimal conditions helps its students to, appreciate the differences that other cultures bring, be comfortable with differences and also seek diversity of contact. The study employed Miville-Guzman Universality – Diversity Scale, (M-GUDS-S) to collect data by survey method from 400 IIUM undergraduate students selected using Quota sampling. 200 of them were the first year students and the rest were fourth-year students. The result showed that there is a significant improvement in the feeling of unity among the students. The fourth year students showed more appreciation for other cultures and comfort with differences. Based on the finding it has been suggested that if efforts are made to establish optimal conditions for positive intergroup contact to take place, intergroup prejudice can be reduced and problems of co-existence in the Muslim countries and communities can thus be addressed.

Stereotypes as Pseudocontingencies

ABSTRACTWe introduce a heuristic called pseudocontingencies (PCs) as an alternative account of various stereotyping phenomena. PCs give rise to the expectation that attributes are correlated based solely on asymmetries in attribute base rates. Attributes that are encountered frequently and attributes that are encountered rarely are perceived to be correlated with each other. Such differences in information densities are typical of many stereotyped targets, including the self vs. others, the in-group vs. out-groups and majority vs. minority groups. Evidence is reviewed for PCs underlying illusory correlations, confirmation biases, gender stereotypes, Simpson’s paradox, and in procedures used for implicit stereotype measurement. PCs are shown to predict specific patterns of self-enhancement and self-depreciation, the effects of intergroup contact on in-group biases and the readiness to infer stereotypes from aggregated “big-data”. Although PCs can lead to seriously flawed stereotypic expectations, they afford an efficient and possibly adaptive inference strategy.

The density of social networks moderates effects of intergroup contact

This study tests how the density of the social network in which intergroup contact takes place might affect the extent to which contact improves intergroup attitudes. Having contact with more outgroup members in dense social networks, in which everybody knows each other, may reinforce contact's positive effect. In this case, outgroup contact is shared with ingroup members, which suggests positive ingroup norms toward the outgroup. Alternatively, more contact in denser networks may improve intergroup attitudes less because density may increase subtyping or reduce the salience of ethnic group memberships. These competing hypotheses are tested among white American adults in a nonprobability online sample (N=305) and in a representative national sample (N=1270). In both studies, contact is associated with more positive attitudes toward racial outgroups but the positive contact effect is weakened if that contact takes place in a denser social network.

A Cook's Tour Abroad: Long‐Term Effects of Intergroup Contact on Positive Outgroup Attitudes

This mixed‐methods, longitudinal study documents the short‐ and long‐term impact of a cook's tour of Vietnam by 14 U.S. chef students. Over 3 weeks, travelers engaged in myriad intergroup interactions to experience Vietnam's cuisine and culture, exemplifying a positive intergroup orientation consistent with allophilia and xenophilia. Measures included a pretrip questionnaire, daily journal, and posttrip questionnaire, as well as participant observation. Short‐term attitude change included significant increases in positive affect toward the Vietnamese, negative stereotypes, and intergroup understanding. Nearly 10 years later, the author interviewed 10 of the original trip participants. Consistent with allophilia theory, participants expressed continued affection, kinship, and enthusiasm toward the Vietnamese people and remained motivated to engage the Vietnamese culture and cuisine. Additional evidence of allophilic specificity, openness to experience, and deprovincialism is also discussed.

Developmental Dynamics of Intergroup Contact and Intergroup Attitudes: Long-Term Effects in Adolescence and Early Adulthood.

Intergroup contact represents a powerful way to improve intergroup attitudes and to overcome prejudice and discrimination. However, long-term effects of intergroup contact that consider social network dynamics have rarely been studied at a young age. Study 1 validated an optimized social network approach to investigate intergroup contact (N=6,457; Mage =14.91years). Study 2 explored the developmental trajectories of intergroup contact by applying this validated network approach in a cross-sequential design (four-cohort-four-wave; N=3,815; 13-26years). Accelerated growth curve models showed that contact predicts the development of attitudes in adolescence, whereas acquired attitudes buffer against decreasing contact in adulthood. Findings highlight the potential of social network analysis and the developmental importance of early intergroup contact experiences.

Predicting support for collective action in the conflict between Turks and Kurds: Perceived threats as a mediator of intergroup contact and social identity

Two studies investigated the role of perceived realistic and symbolic threats in predicting collective action tendencies, and in mediating effects of intergroup contact and social identity on collective action in the context of an intractable conflict. Extending earlier research on collective action, integrated threat theory, and intergroup contact theory, we tested whether realistic and symbolic threats would predict collective action tendencies and outgroup attitudes; and mediate the effects of intergroup contact and social identity on collective action tendencies and outgroup attitudes among the advantaged, Turks, and the disadvantaged, Kurds. Findings from both studies (Study 1, N = 289 Turks; Study 2, N = 209 Kurds) supported the predictive and mediating role of threats on collective action tendencies and outgroup attitudes. Overall findings suggest that advantaged and disadvantaged groups might not always have disparate psychologies regarding collective action and incorporating perceived threats as antecedents of collective action can help to explain collective action tendencies among both groups especially in conflictual contexts.

An experimental study of the effect of intergroup contact on attitudes in urban China

A large body of literature attests to the growing social divide between urban residents and rural–urban migrants in China’s cities. This study uses a randomised experiment to test the effect of intergroup contact on attitudes between a group of urban adolescents and a group of rural–urban migrant adolescents. Results showed that intergroup contact in the form of a fun and cooperative puzzle task significantly reduced negative attitudes toward the other group. Implications for desegregated schooling and their broader societal implications in China are discussed.

Reducing Turkish Cypriot children’s prejudice toward Greek Cypriots: Vicarious and extended intergroup contact through storytelling

Two studies investigated the effectiveness of intergroup contact in Turkish Cypriot children with the aim of improving attitudes, intentions, and trust toward Greek Cypriots. In the first study, we found that positive contact and positive family storytelling were associated with more positive outgroup attitudes and intended outgroup behavior in a group of 6- to 12-year-old Turkish Cypriots. We followed this up in Study 2 by using a vicarious intergroup contact intervention technique. Turkish Cypriot children aged 6–11 years took part in a 3-week intervention involving reading stories of solidarity between Turkish and Greek Cypriot children. Results showed that the intervention worked to improve outgroup attitudes, intended behavior, and outgroup trust. These findings suggest that indirect contact techniques such as extended contact and vicarious intergroup contact can be used as prejudice-reduction tools in intractable conflict zones, most in need of such interventions.

Group Norms as Moderator in The Effect of Cross Group Friendship on Outgroup Attitude: A Study on Interreligious Group in Indonesia

Past studies indicate that the effect of intergroup contact on outgroup attitude is not isolated to contextual factors. One of the contextual factors that has begun to be studied is group norm. However, group norm in these studies is still merely conceptualized as the perception of how ingroup members evaluate outgroup members. In fact, according to norm focus theory, in a given context, individuals are influenced, at least, by two types of group norms, namely injunctive norms (i.e., what most people morally accept to do) and descriptive norms (i.e., what most people do). To fill the gap, present studies attempt to answer the question of how two types of group norms might have different effects on the relationship of intergroup contact and outgroup attitude. Built on past studies, it was hypothesized that both quality (H1) and quantity (H2) of cross-group friendship would positively affect outgroup attitude. Further, built on the fact that the nature of attitude in present studies is more utilitarian than hedonic, it was predicted that injunctive norms would be more likely to function as moderator in the effect of cross-group friendship on outgroup attitude, either in dimensions of quality (H3) or quantity (H4). 110 Muslim students were recruited as participants and asked to fill in a self-report questionnaire regarding their interactions with Christians. The findings partly support the hypotheses.

Media Usage and Acculturation: Asian Indian Professionals in Silicon Valley

We examine connections between media use, intergroup contact, and acculturation in 237 Asian Indian professionals in Silicon Valley, drawing on theories of immigrant acculturation, intergroup contact, and media effects. Quality of host contact positively predicted acculturation. Indian (ethnic) media consumption negatively predicted acculturation, and American (host) media consumption was positively related to acculturation. Ethnic television viewing exacerbated the effects of negative intergroup contact on acculturation. Respondents used social networking websites to maintain both host and ethnic ties. Host cultural/informational capital was positively related to acculturation. Host media consumption was positively related to political engagement and loneliness.

Specific emotions as mediators of the effect of intergroup contact on prejudice: findings across multiple participant and target groups

ABSTRACTEmotions are increasingly being recognised as important aspects of prejudice and intergroup behaviour. Specifically, emotional mediators play a key role in the process by which intergroup contact reduces prejudice towards outgroups. However, which particular emotions are most important for prejudice reduction, as well as the consistency and generality of emotion–prejudice relations across different in-group–out-group relations, remain uncertain. To address these issues, in Study 1 we examined six distinct positive and negative emotions as mediators of the contact–prejudice relations using representative samples of U.S. White, Black, and Asian American respondents (N = 639). Admiration and anger (but not other emotions) were significant mediators of the effects of previous contact on prejudice, consistently across different perceiver and target ethnic groups. Study 2 examined the same relations with student participants and gay men as the out-group. Admiration and disgust mediated the effect of past contact on attitude. The findings confirm that not only negative emotions (anger or disgust, based on the specific types of threat perceived to be posed by an out-group), but also positive, status- and esteem-related emotions (admiration) mediate effects of contact on prejudice, robustly across several different respondent and target groups.