Differential Effects of Intergroup Contact for Authoritarians and Social Dominators: A Dual Process Model Perspective

TL;DR: Person-based factors influence a range of meaningful life outcomes, including intergroup processes, and have long been implicated in explaining prejudice as mentioned in this paper, and they are evident in expressions of generalised prejudice, a robust finding that some people consistently score higher in prejudice towards multiple outgroups.

TL;DR: A mathematical model is introduced by which the findings of the two literatures on intergroup interaction and intergroup contact can be reconciled and it is believed that adopting this model will streamline thinking in the field and will generate integrative new research in which investigators examine how a person’s experiences with diversity unfold.

TL;DR: Hodson et al. as mentioned in this paper explored individual differences in the benefits of positive group contact on attitudes and found that positive and negative group contact among children and its effect on attitudes had different effects on attitudes.

Abstract: Early research on prejudice resulted in two important empirical observations. First, the kinds of social groups or categories that are targeted with prejudice vary markedly in different societies; and second, individuals within societies vary markedly in the degree to which they are generally prejudiced or generally tolerant. This suggested that we need two kinds of theories to explain prejudice. In the first case, societal or intergroup theories have focused on particular kinds of intergroup relations (e.g., intergroup competition, threat, or inequality) that would cause prejudice to be directed against specific groups and to be widely shared within a particular society. Thomas Pettigrew (1958) referred to this as the “specificity of prejudice.” In the second case, individual difference theories have focused on certain stable characteristics of individuals (e.g., personality, values, motives, or ideological beliefs) that could cause them to be generally more or less prejudiced against all or most target groups. Early theorists referred to this as the “generality of prejudice” or “generalized prejudice” (e.g., Allport, 1954). More recently, however, theories have emerged that can encompass both individual and intergroup factors within their explanatory frameworks. The dual process model (DPM) is one such approach. It was originally formulated to explain systematic individual differences in generalized prejudice, which it did in terms of two basic motivational orientations that dispose individuals to be generally prejudiced or tolerant. It also, however, proposed that these two motivational orientations would be largely activated by socially shared situational and intergroup factors (such as intergroup competition, threat, and inequality). In this way both individual and social or intergroup factors would operate together to generate prejudices. These prejudices are both specific (widely shared and directed against targets specific to a particular society) and generalized (with individuals in these societies varying systematically in the degree to which they were generally prejudiced or tolerant). The DPM encompasses three closely intertwined explanatory contributions to the understanding of prejudice. First, it conceptualizes the two major social attitudinal predictors of individual differences in prejudice as expressions of two distinct motivational goal or value dimensions. Second, the DPM shows how these two motivationally based ideological dimensions are shaped by and emerge from different social and psychological bases. And third, the DPM provides an explanation of why these two motivationally based dimensions cause prejudice and describes how they operate in a complementary and interactive fashion with social and intergroup causes of prejudice.

Abstract: The issue of personality and prejudice has been largely investigated in terms of authoritarianism and social dominance orientation. However, these seem more appropriately conceptualized as ideological attitudes than as personality dimensions. The authors describe a causal model linking dual dimensions of personality, social world view, ideological attitudes, and intergroup attitudes. Structural equation modeling with data from American and White Afrikaner students supported the model, suggesting that social conformity and belief in a dangerous world influence authoritarian attitudes, whereas toughmindedness and belief in a competitive jungle world influence social dominance attitudes, and these two ideological attitude dimensions influence intergroup attitudes. The model implies that dual motivational and cognitive processes, which may be activated by different kinds of situational and intergroup dynamics, may underlie 2 distinct dimensions of prejudice.

TL;DR: This article analyzed the relationship of ethnic prejudice and discriminatory behavioral intentions in Germany and found that prejudice is substantially correlated with the respondents' reports of their own discriminatory intentions (R=.33 to.49).

TL;DR: The authors found that respondents from East Germany consistently show higher levels of ethnic prejudice than respondents from West Germany, and the hypothesis that this difference can be largely explained by contrasting interethnic contact opportunities and experiences is tested and supported.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors explored Person's×'Contact' and Person'×'Friendship interaction patterns among heterosexual university students and found that intergroup contact is associated with positive intergroup attitudes, but little is known about whether individual differences moderate these relations or how contact might operate among prejudice-prone individuals.