Consistent with the affiliative social tuning hypothesis, this study showed that the desire to get along with another person shifted participants’ automatic attitudes toward the ostensible attitudes of that person. In Experiment 1, the automatic racial attitudes of women but not men emulated those of an experimenter displaying race-egalitarian attitudes or attitudes neutral with respect to race. Mediational analysis revealed that the gender difference in social tuning was mediated by liking for the experimenter. In Experiment 2, the likability of the experimenter was manipulated. Individuals who interacted with a likable experimenter exhibited social tuning more so than did those who interacted with a rude experimenter. These findings suggest that affiliative motives may elicit malleability of automatic attitudes independent of manipulations of social group exemplars.
News
Life of the Mind | African American Studies: Science of Racial Bias
Reproduced from Princeton Alumni Weekly Life of the Mind African American Studies: Science of Racial Bias By Amelia Thomson-Deveaux ’11 Racial and gender bias can seem deeply ingrained, but wearing your egalitarianism on your sleeve can help reduce biased behavior in others, according to Stacey Sinclair, an associate professor of psychology and African American studies….
You Are Who You Know: How Ethnic Attitudes and Interpersonal Interactions Shape One Another
Race and Difference Colloquium Series at Emory University Sponsored by the James Weldon Johnson Institute for the Study of Race and Difference When seeking to describe stereotyping and prejudice it is common to characterize them as something in the air, shaping individuals via biased media depictions and institutions that subjugate some while rewarding others….