Outgroup Evaluations Research Articles

When different means bad or merely worse. How minimal and maximal goals affect ingroup projection and outgroup attitudes

AbstractGroup members tend to perceive their ingroup relative to an outgroup as more prototypical for a common superordinate group because they project features of their ingroup onto the superordinate group. As a consequence, the ingroup is perceived as more positive than the outgroup (Mummendey & Wenzel, 1999). We extend the ingroup projection model by examining different types of ingroup goals: minimal and maximal goals as well as actual and ideal goals. Minimal goals should engender either‐or thinking and lead to more ingroup projection compared with maximal goals that should involve more nuanced thinking. Ingroup prototypicality in terms of ideal goals (e.g., what we ideally should strive for) was expected to show a stronger relation to outgroup attitudes than ingroup prototypicality in terms of actual goals (e.g., what we are actually striving for). We manipulated minimal and maximal goal orientation and assessed actual and ideal goals. Across two studies, relative ingroup prototypicality was higher in the minimal compared with the maximal goal condition. Moreover, ingroup prototypicality referring to ideal goals showed a stronger relation to outgroup evaluation than ingroup prototypicality referring to actual goals. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Intergroup disgust sensitivity as a predictor of islamophobia: The modulating effect of fear

The present research investigated whether intergroup disgust sensitivity (ITG-DS) predicts greater Islamophobia, and whether this positive association is modulated (strengthened or weakened) by the experience of concurrent incidental non-disgust emotions (fear, sadness, anger, happiness). In Study 1 (N=225) participants completed measures of ITG-DS (an emotionally charged individual difference variable reflecting heightened tendency to experience disgust and revulsion reactions toward ethnic outgroup encounters) and dispositional measures of fear, sadness, anger, and happiness. Results revealed that among those experiencing greater (vs. lower) fear or sadness, the positive relation between ITG-DS and Islamophobia was significantly stronger. In Study 2 (N=174), fear, sadness, and happiness were experimentally induced. Among those induced to experience fear, the positive relation between ITG-DS and prejudice toward Muslims was significantly strengthened relative to control. Overall, specific negative emotions, especially fear, interacted with individual differences in intergroup-relevant disgust sensitivity to inform outgroup evaluations.

‘Rallying around the flag’: Can an intergroup contact intervention promote national unity?

A longitudinal study evaluated the success of a contact-based nation-building intervention (the Malaysian National Service Programme) in promoting various facets of national unity. The study assessed how post-test measures of quality of intergroup contact, outgroup evaluations, and levels of identification changed compared to their respective pre-test levels, for both National Service and control group participants. The intervention did not lead to a worsening of any of the constructs related to intergroup relations, which is noteworthy given the novelty for many participants of mixing in a multi-ethnic setting. Furthermore, all rater groups (Malays, Chinese, and Indians) maintained their ethnic identity, even in the presence of high levels of national identity, which we discuss with respect to past research on the effects of positive intergroup contact on minority group identification. However, the changes associated with the intervention yielded only small effect sizes, and, on the whole, National Service participants did not show significantly greater improvement than that experienced by control participants. We discuss the value of intergroup contact in this novel setting, considering various features of this programme that may have limited its effectiveness and discuss how such interventions can more successfully meet their goals.

Ethnic Group Labels and Intergroup Attitudes in New Zealand: Naming Preferences Predict Distinct Ingroup and Outgroup Biases

New Zealand society is unique in that New Zealanders of European descent (the majority group) are regularly labeled in institutional and popular discourse using an ethnic group label created by Māori (the indigenous minority group). This label is “Pākehā.” Endorsement of this label is by no means consensual, and opposition to its use is often claimed on the grounds that the term is pejorative. We tested the validity of this concern in a national sample (N = 6,507) by assessing differences in the ingroup and outgroup evaluations of Māori and New Zealanders of European descent based on their label preferences. We found no support for the claim that the term “Pākehā” is associated with a negative evaluation of the majority group. Rather, Māori expressed positive attitudes toward New Zealanders of European descent regardless of the label they preferred to describe them. For Māori, use of the term “Pākehā” was instead indicative of ingroup cultural engagement, including the use of Māori language, and had little to do with outgroup attitudes. New Zealanders of European descent who preferred the term “Pākehā,” in contrast, expressed more positive attitudes toward Māori than those who preferred the terms “New Zealand European,”“New Zealander,” or “Kiwi.”

Contact, evaluation and social distance: Differentiating majority and minority effects

Contact research has traditionally focused on reducing negative attitudes or emotions towards outgroups. In the current studies we focus on reduced social distance as an outcome of intergroup contact – that is a person's desire to have increased contact with members of a group – and investigate whether outgroup evaluation in associated with these generalizing effects of contact. Drawing on data from a large sample of secondary school students in Australia gathered from majority and minority group members the findings demonstrate that having contact with an outgroup reduces social distance to the group in general. However, for majority group members, evaluation of the minority group is a strong predictor of social distance and evaluation is also improved with intergroup contact. Importantly, evaluations of the outgroup play no such role for minority group members. The findings highlight an alternate model for understanding contact effects and suggest that reduced social distance rather than improved outgroup evaluations may be more important in understanding minority responses to contact.

Longitudinal effects of contact on intergroup relations: The role of majority and minority group membership and intergroup emotions

AbstractA field study was conducted in the Italian context to examine the longitudinal effects of contact on improved intergroup relations, and to test whether the effects were different for majority and minority group members. Furthermore, we examined the processes underlying contact effects. Participants were 68 Italian (majority) and 31 immigrant (minority) secondary school students, who completed a questionnaire at two time points. The results of regression analyses showed that, consistent with the contact hypothesis (Allport, 1954), quantity and quality of contact longitudinally improved outgroup evaluation and increased the attribution of positive stereotypes to the outgroup; the reverse paths were non‐significant. Notably, whereas quantity of contact improved intergroup attitudes and stereotypes for both majority and minority participants, quality of contact had reliable effects only for the majority group. Intergroup anxiety and empathy mediated the longitudinal effects of quantity of contact for both Italians and immigrants; the cross‐lagged effects of contact quality on criterion variables for the Italian group were mediated by intergroup empathy. The theoretical and practical implications of findings are discussed. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Intergroup evaluations, group indispensability and prototypicality judgments: A study in Mauritius

This paper focuses on the superordinate (national)-subgroup (ethnic) association in relation to group identifications, relative ingroup indispensability, relative ingroup prototypicality and their effects on outgroup and ingroup evaluations. Survey data were collected from a large sample of Mauritian adolescents ( N = 1,784) from three ethnic groups (Hindus, Muslims, Creoles). National and dual identifiers were more positive towards the outgroups than ethnic identifiers. Furthermore, relative ingroup prototypicality and relative ingroup indispensability were empirically distinguishable constructs. The Creoles, who are of lower status, had higher scores on both these measures. Also it turned out that relative ingroup indispensability and relative ingroup prototypicality were independently associated to respectively more negative outgroup evaluation and more positive ingroup evaluation. The findings give a differentiated view of the idea that a complex representation of the superordinate category fosters outgroup acceptance.

Priming a sense of security: What goes through people’s minds?

There is a growing literature charting the positive personal and interpersonal effects of security priming. Security primes enhance self- and relationship views, and even evaluations of outgroups, relative to control primes. We examine how security priming is experienced by individuals and how its effects differ from those produced by other positive affect and relationship-related primes. We analyze the written protocols produced by individuals in different priming conditions for frequency of felt security, care, merging, agency, communion, and nostalgia words. Security priming led to thoughts related to felt security, positive care, a sense of merging with another, positive emotion, and communion; furthermore, the effects of security priming could be distinguished from the effects of positive affect and other relationship-related primes. We discuss several directions for future research.

Direct and Extended Friendship Effects on Minority and Majority Children’s Interethnic Attitudes: A Longitudinal Study

Longitudinal direct and extended cross-ethnic friendship effects on out-group evaluations among German (majority status, N = 76) and Turkish (minority status, N = 73) children (age 7-11 years) in ethnically heterogeneous elementary schools were examined at the beginning and end of the school year (time lag: 7 months). The results showed that among majority status children, but not minority status children, direct cross-ethnic friendship predicted over time positive out-group evaluations. This association was partly mediated by perceived social norms about cross-ethnic friendship relations. No longitudinal effects of extended cross-ethnic friendship were found. These results suggest that in ethnically heterogeneous contexts, direct friendship is more effective in changing intergroup attitudes than extended friendship and that social status moderates direct friendship effects.

Sensitivity of N170 and late positive components to social categorization and emotional valence

Previous experiments have shown that categorization of people into two distinct fictive groups has an impact on cognitive processes. The main objective of the present study was to examine whether this mere categorization improves information processing speed and alters early and late onset ERPs during a social judgment task. In a group membership situation, in-group evaluation enhanced information processing speed and occipito-temporal N170 amplitudes, associated with orthographic processing, compared to out-group evaluation, more so for positive than negative attributes. Moreover, negative adjectives elicited larger N170 amplitudes and faster information processing speed than positive adjectives. In contrast, positive adjectives in a non-membership context enhanced a late positive component in prefrontal regions. These results reflect the existence of a motivational top–down influence due to social categorization in early perceptual stages of word processing. These findings are also in accord with the existence of two distinct systems of evaluation, the first implicating an automatic processing represented in occipito-temporal neocortex and the other a more controlled processing represented in PFC.

Vicarious Intergroup Contact and the Role of Authorities in Prejudice Reduction

The present study focuses on the effect of vicarious intergroup contact and the support of an authority figure on the improvement of outgroup and meta-stereotype evaluations. Meta-stereotype refers to the shared beliefs of ingroup members about how they consider outgroup members to perceive their group. Three preliminary studies were carried out to determine desirable and undesirable characteristics for a good basketball performance, the task that best demonstrates the application of these characteristics, and the two groups (basketball teams) that should be involved in the vicarious intergroup contact. Fans of one of the basketball teams participated in the current study. Vicarious intergroup contact improved outgroup and meta-stereotype evaluations as compared with a no contact condition. In addition, the positive effects of vicarious intergroup contact significantly increased when it was supported by an authority figure. More importantly, our study also shows that the improvement of outgroup evaluation was partially mediated by changes on meta-stereotypes.

Imagining Intergroup Contact Can Improve Intergroup Attitudes

We investigated whether simply imagining contact with outgroup members can improve intergroup attitudes. In Experiment 1, young participants who imagined talking to an elderly person subsequently showed lower levels of intergroup bias than participants who imagined an outdoor scene. In Experiment 2, young participants who imagined talking to an elderly person subsequently showed lower levels of intergroup bias than participants who simply thought about elderly people, ruling out a priming explanation for our findings. In Experiment 3, heterosexual men who imagined talking to a homosexual man subsequently evaluated homosexual men more positively, perceived there to be greater variability among them, and experienced less intergroup anxiety compared to a control group. The effect of imagined contact on outgroup evaluations was mediated by reduced intergroup anxiety. These findings suggest that imagining intergroup contact could represent a viable alternative for reducing prejudice where actual contact between groups is impractical.

The link between identification and in‐group favouritism: Effects of threat to social identity and trust‐related emotions

The relation between identification and in-group favouritism was analysed across two studies, in which the relevance of three intervening factors was demonstrated: (a) the moderating role of social identity threat, (b) the mediating role of trust-related emotions experienced towards in-group and out-group members, and (c) the importance of the distinction between in-group and out-group evaluations. When the in-group was not threatened, the link between identification and in-group bias was unreliable. The effect of in-group identification on in-group bias was stronger when either the value or the distinctiveness of the in-group were threatened. A value threat strengthened the influence of identification on in-group evaluation and, via out-group distrust, on out-group derogation. Under a distinctiveness threat, identification affected out-group evaluation and intergroup differentiation. These results demonstrate that the relation between identification and in-group favouritism is reliable only in a clear intergroup context. Moreover, they show that the role and the strength of in-group and out-group trust are altered by the type of social identity threat introduced. Finally, they clarify that in-group love and out-group hate phenomena are not zero-sum, and that their presence may be simultaneous when the value of the in-group is threatened by out-group members.

Ethnic Group Identification and Group Evaluation Among Minority and Majority Groups: Testing the Multiculturalism Hypothesis.

Following social identity theory, the author hypothesized that members of minority groups are more likely than majority group members to endorse multiculturalism more strongly and assimilationist thinking less strongly. In addition, the multiculturalism hypothesis proposes that the more minority groups endorse the ideology of multiculturalism (or assimilationism), the more (or less) likely they will be to identify with their ethnic in-group and to show positive in-group evaluation. In contrast, the more majority group members endorse multiculturalism (or assimilationism), the less (or more) likely they are to identify with their ethnic group and to show negative out-group evaluation. Results from 4 studies (correlational and experimental) provide support for this hypothesis among Dutch and Turkish participants living in the Netherlands.

The effects of perspective-taking on prejudice: the moderating role of self-evaluation.

Perspective-taking, by means of creating an overlap between self and other cognitive representations, has been found to effectively decrease stereotyping and ingroup favoritism. In the present investigation, the authors examined the potential moderating role of self-esteem on the effects of perspective-taking on prejudice. In two experiments, it was found that perspective-takers, but not control participants, with temporarily or chronically high self-esteem evaluated an outgroup more positively than perspective-takers with low self-esteem. This finding suggests an irony of perspective-taking: it builds off egocentric biases to improve outgroup evaluations. The discussion focuses on how debiasing intergroup thought is often best accomplished by working through the very processes that produced the bias in the first place.

The Emergence of Ethnic and Racial Attitudes in Preschool-Aged Children

The author assessed preschool-aged children's attitudes (N = 70) toward their own and 2 ethnic or racial out-groups using traditional forced-choice measures and a new method that assessed children's out-group attitudes independently of their attitudes toward their own group. When required to assign positive and negative traits to either their own group or an ethnic or racial out-group, children evaluated their own group favorably relative to the out-group in question. However, when not forced to choose between groups, children evaluated out-groups positively, indicating that own-group preference relative to ethnic and racial out-groups was not equated with out-group rejection. Children's positive out-group evaluations did vary with the out-group being considered and were reflective of the local social context, suggesting the influence of social learning. The results indicate that young children's positive feelings toward their own group do not necessarily involve or cause negative out-group attitudes and that various factors might differentially influence in-group and out-group attitudes.

Self, in‐group, and out‐group evaluation: bond or breach?

AbstractA number of studies have looked at causes of in‐group bias, but few studies have actually investigated whether the two components of in‐group bias, i.e. in‐group and out‐group evaluation, are related to each other and whether they have similar or different predictors. In the Fiji Islands, self‐, in‐group, and out‐group evaluations were obtained using within‐subject correlations from a sample of 336 indigenous and Indian Fijians. Self‐evaluation was positively related to in‐group evaluation, and both were positively related to out‐group evaluation, supporting a spillover model. After controlling for background variables and the other evaluation variables, regression analyses showed that in‐group identification was positively related to in‐group evaluation, and social distance and political ethnocentrism were negatively related to out‐group evaluation. Additionally, ethnicity interacted with collective self‐esteem in determining both in‐group favouritism and out‐group derogation. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Book Reviews

Toward phenomenology of groups and group membership - an introduction, H. Sondak Using existential-phenomenology to study a work team, R. Stablein Transitory interactions - fieldwork on the phenomenology of groups in organizations, A.B. Hargadon Why some teams emphasize learning more than others - evidence from business unit management teams, J.S. Bunderson, K.M. Sutcliffe Creating and reducing intergroup conflict - the role of perspective-taking in affecting out-group evaluations, A.D. Galinsky Terms of engagement - why do people invest themselves in work?, T.R. Tyler, S. Blader Why am I here? The influence of group and relational attributes on member-initiated team selection, Z.I. Barsness et al. Familiarity in groups - exploring the relationship between inter-member familiarity and group behavior, T.L. Rockett, G.A. Okhuysen Helping transnational team members to sense trust - a counterintuitive approach to leadership, G.M. Spreitzer et al. Getting and staying in-pace - the "in-synch" preference and its implications for work groups, S. Blount, G. Janicik Making sense of the phenomenology of groups and group membership, H. Sondak.

Self-Anchoring in the Minimal Group Paradigm: The Impact of Need and Ability to Achieve Cognitive Structure

A study is reported that focused on the role of self-anchoring in the definition of social groups. We assumed that group members give meaning to a novel ingroup by defining it as similar to the self. Moreover, the need and ability to engage in cognitive structuring should affect this process. A minimal group study in which self, ingroup and outgroup evaluations were obtained supported these hypotheses. Regression analysis revealed that self-evaluations predicted ingroup evaluations, but that this effect was qualified by an interaction with ability and need for cognitive structuring. Participants high both in the need for cognitive structure and the ability to achieve cognitive structure relied most heavily on the self as a heuristic for ingroup evaluations.

Intergroup Attitudes as a Function of Different Dimensions of Group Identification and Perceived Intergroup Conflict

This study investigates the multidimensional nature of group identity and how different dimensions are uniquely related to ingroup and outgroup evaluations, intergroup bias, and perceived intergroup conflict. A three-dimensional model of group identity—consisting of a cognitive, evaluative, and affective-ties component—was supported across ascribed, achieved, and face-to-face groups. As predicted, of the three dimensions, affective ties to the ingroup was the best overall predictor of intergroup bias. In support of social identity theory, the impact of the evaluative and cognitive dimensions on group attitudes was significantly moderated by perceptions of conflict. Additionally, as predicted, group identification led to exaggerated positive evaluations of the ingroup, while perceived conflict led to exaggerated negative evaluations of the outgroup. Theoretical implications and future research avenues are discussed.