Group Processes & Intergroup Relations

 

Advanced Search

Journal Navigation

Journal Home

Subscriptions

Archive

Contact Us

Table of Contents

Sign In to gain access to subscriptions and/or personal tools.
This Article
Right arrow Abstract Freely available
Right arrow Free Full Text (Free PDF) Free
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Right arrow Citation Map
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to Saved Citations
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow Add to My Marked Citations
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via HighWire
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Moreno, K. N.
Right arrow Articles by Bodenhausen, G. V.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati  
What's this?
Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, Vol. 2, No. 1, 5-16 (1999)
DOI: 10.1177/1368430299021001
© 1999 SAGE Publications

Resisting Stereotype Change: The Role of Motivation and Attentional Capacity in Defending Social Beliefs

Kristen N. Moreno

Northwestern University, Evanston, k-moreno{at}nwu.edu

Galen V. Bodenhausen

Northwestern University, Evanston

We hypothesized that, by default, perceivers work to defend their social beliefs when counter stereotypic information is encountered. This process was expected to be circumvented when perceivers (a) adopt an accuracy orientation, or (b) lack the cognitive resources required for protecting their stereotypic beliefs. We examined this issue by manipulating perceivers' motivation and attentional capacity. Participants formed impressions of several targets displaying stereotype-consistent, -inconsistent, or -irrelevant behavior. Stereotypicality of participants' subsequent group perceptions was assessed via trait ratings. As predicted, following exposure to counter stereotypic information, participants maintained relatively greater levels of stereotyping when accuracy motivation was low and processing resources were high. We conclude that, although perceivers are typically motivated to defend their stereotypes, this process is effortful and can be disrupted by the imposition of a cognitive load or superseded by the induction of accuracy motivation.

Key Words: stereotype change • subtyping

References

  • Allport, G. W. (1954). The nature of prejudice. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
  • Bargh, J. (1997). The automaticity of everyday life. In R. S. Wyer, Jr. (Ed.), The automaticity of everyday life: Advances in social cognition (Vol. 10, pp. 1-61). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
  • Baumeister, R. F., & Newman, L. S. (1994). Self-regulation of cognitive inference and decision processes. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 20, 3-19.[Abstract]
  • Bodenhausen, G. V. (1990). Stereotypes as judgmental heuristics: Evidence of circadian variations in discrimination. Psychological Science, 1, 319-322.
  • Bodenhausen, G. V., & Lichtenstein, M. (1987). Social stereotypes and information-processing strategies: The impact of task complexity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 871-880.[CrossRef][ISI][Medline] [Order article via Infotrieve]
  • Bodenhausen, G. V., & Macrae, C. N. (1994). Coherence versus ambivalence in cognitive representations of persons. In R. Wyer (Ed.), Associated systems theory: Advances in social cognition (Vol. 7, pp. 149-156). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
  • Bodenhausen, G. V., Macrae, C. N., & Garst, J. (1998). Stereotypes in thought and deed: Social-cognitive origins of intergroup discrimination. In C. Sedikides, J. Schopler, & C. Insko (Eds.), Intergroup cognition and intergroup behavior (pp. 311-335). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
  • Cahill, C., Al-Eithan, M., & Frith, C. D. (1993). Conscious and unconscious rule induction. Consciousness & Cognition, 2, 210-224.[CrossRef]
  • Chaiken, S., Giner-Sorolla, R., & Chen, S. (1996). Beyond accuracy: Defense and impression motives in heuristic and systematic information processing. In P. M. Gollwitzer & J. A. Bargh (Eds.), The psychology of action: Linking cognition and motivation to behavior (pp. 553-578). New York: Guilford.
  • Chaiken, S., & Trope, Y. (in press). Dual process theories in social psychology. New York: Guilford Press.
  • Cheng, P. W., & Holyoak, KJ. (1995). Complex adaptive systems as intuitive statisticians: Causality, contingency, and prediction. In H. L. Roitblat & J.-A. Meyer (Eds.), Comparative approaches to cognitive science: Complex adaptive systems (pp. 271-302). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  • Erber, R., & Fiske, S. T. (1984). Outcome dependency and attention to inconsistent information. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 47, 709-726.[CrossRef]
  • Fiske, S. T. (1998). Stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination. In D. T. Gilbert, S. T. Fiske, & G. Lindzey (Eds.), Handbook of social psychology (4th ed., Vol. 2, pp. 357-411). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill.
  • Fiske, S. T., & Taylor, S. E. (1991). Social cognition (2nd ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.
  • Förster, J., Higgins, E. T., & Strack, F. (1998). Stereotype disconfirmation as personal threat. Manuscript submitted for publication.
  • Gabriel, S., & Bodenhausen, G. V. (1998). Effects of level of self-categorization on perceptions of ingroup behavior. Manuscript submitted for publication.
  • Gilbert, D. T. (1991). How mental systems believe. American Psychologist, 46, 107-119.[CrossRef]
  • Gilbert, D. T., & Osborne, R. E. (1989). Thinking backward: Some curable and incurable consequences of cognitive busyness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 57, 940-949.[CrossRef]
  • Gurwitz, S. B., & Dodge, K. A. (1977). Effects of confirmations and disconfirmations on stereotype-based attributions. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35, 495-500.[CrossRef]
  • Hamilton, D. L., & Sherman, J. W. (1994). Stereotypes. In R. S. Wyer, Jr. & T. K Srull (Eds.), Handbook of social cognition (2nd ed., pp. 1-68). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
  • Hewstone, M. (1990). The `ultimate attribution error'? A review of the literature on intergroup causal attributions. European Journal of Social Psychology, 20, 311-335.
  • Hewstone, M. (1994). Revision and change of stereotypic beliefs: In search of the elusive subtyping model. European Review of Social Psychology, 5, 69-109.
  • Hewstone, M., Hopkins, N., & Routh, D. A. (1992). Cognitive models of stereotype change: (1) Generalization and subtyping in young people's views of the police. European Journal of Social Psychology, 22, 219-234.
  • Hewstone, M., Johnston, L., & Aird, P. (1992). Cognitive models of stereotype change: (2) Perceptions of homogeneous and heterogeneous groups. European Journal of Social Psychology, 22, 235-249.
  • Hewstone, M., Macrae, C. N., Griffiths, R., Milne, A. B., & Brown, R. (1994). Cognitive models of stereotype change: (5). Measurement, development, and consequences of subtyping. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 30, 505-526.[CrossRef]
  • Johnston, L., & Hewstone, M. (1992). Cognitive models of stereotype change: 3. Subtyping and the perceived typicality of disconfirming group members. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 28, 360-386.[CrossRef]
  • Johnston, L., Hewstone, M., Pendry, L., & Frankish, C. (1994). Cognitive models of stereotype change (4): Motivational and cognitive influences. European Journal of Social Psychology, 24, 237-265.
  • Johnston, L., & Macrae, C. N. (1994). Changing social stereotypes: The case of the information seeker. European Journal of Social Psychology, 24, 581-592.
  • Jost, J. T., & Banaji, M. R. (1994). The role of stereotyping in system-justification and the production of false consciousness. British Journal of Social Psychology, 33, 1-27.
  • Kunda, Z. (1990). The case for motivated reasoning. Psychological Bulletin, 108, 480-498.[CrossRef][ISI][Medline] [Order article via Infotrieve]
  • Kunda, Z., & Oleson, K. C. (1995). Maintaining stereotypes in the face of disconfirmation: Constructing grounds for subtyping deviants. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 68, 565-579.[CrossRef][ISI][Medline] [Order article via Infotrieve]
  • Kunda, Z., & Oleson, K. C. (1997). When exceptions prove the rule: How extremity of deviance determines the impact of deviant examples on stereotypes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 72, 965-979.[CrossRef][ISI][Medline] [Order article via Infotrieve]
  • Kunda, Z., & Sherman-Williams, B. (1993). Stereotypes and the construal of individuating information. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 19, 90-99.[Abstract]
  • Lippmann, W. (1922). Public opinion. New York: Harcourt, Brace.
  • Maass, A., & Arcuri, L. (1992). The role of language in the persistence of stereotypes. In G. R. Semin & K Fiedler (Eds.), Language, interaction, and social cognition (pp. 129-143). London: Sage.
  • MacCoun, R. J. (1998). Biases in the interpretation and use of research results. Annual Review of Psychology, 49, 259-287.[CrossRef][ISI][Medline] [Order article via Infotrieve]
  • Macrae, C. N., Milne, A. B., & Bodenhausen, G. V. (1994). Stereotypes as energy-saving devices: A peek inside the cognitive toolbox. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 66, 37-47.[CrossRef]
  • Matthews, R. C., Buss, R. R., Stanley, W. B., Blanchard-Fields, F., Cho, J., & Druhan, B. (1989). Role of implicit and explicit processes in learning from examples. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition, 15, 1083-1100.[CrossRef]
  • Neuberg, S. L. (1990). The goal of forming accurate impressions during social interactions: Attenuating the impact of negative expectancies. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 56, 374-386.
  • Pyszczynski, T. A., & Greenberg, J. (1987). Toward an integration of cognitive and motivational perspectives on social inference: A biased hypothesis-testing model. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 20, pp. 297-340). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.
  • Roenker, D. L., Thompson, C. P., & Brown, S. C. (1971). Comparison of measures for the estimation of clustering in free recall. Psychological Bulletin, 76, 45-48.[CrossRef]
  • Sagar, H. A., & Schofield, J. W. (1980). Racial and behavioral cues in black and white children's perceptions of ambiguously aggressive acts. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39, 590-598.[CrossRef][ISI][Medline] [Order article via Infotrieve]
  • Sherman, J. W., Lee, A. Y., Bessenoff, G. R., & Frost, L. A. (1998). Stereotype efficiency reconsidered: Encoding flexibility under cognitive load. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 75, 589-606.[CrossRef][ISI][Medline] [Order article via Infotrieve]
  • Sidanius, J. (1993). The psychology of group conflict and the dynamics of oppression: A social dominance perspective. In S. Iyengar & W. J. McGuire (Eds.), Explorations in political psychology (pp. 183-219). Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
  • Tajfel, H. (1981). Human groups and social categories: Studies in social psychology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Tetlock, P. E. (1983). Accountability and complexity of thought. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 45, 74-83.[CrossRef][ISI]
  • Tetlock, P. E. (1991). An alternative metaphor in the study of judgment and choice: People as politicians. Theory &Psychology, 1, 451-475.[Abstract]
  • Trope, Y., & Thompson, E. P. (1997). Asymmetric search of individuating information about stereotyped group members. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73, 229-241.[CrossRef][ISI][Medline] [Order article via Infotrieve]
  • Uleman, J. S., Hon, A., Roman, R. J., & Moskowitz, G. B. (1996). On-line evidence for spontaneous trait inferences at encoding. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 22, 377-394.[Abstract]
  • Weber, R., & Crocker, J. (1983). Cognitive processes in the revision of stereotypic beliefs. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 45, 961-977.[CrossRef]
  • Wegner, D. M., & Bargh, J. A. (1998). Control and automaticity in social life. In D. T. Gilbert, S. T. Fiske, & G. Lindzey (Eds.), Handbook of social psychology (4th ed., Vol. 1, pp. 446-496). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill.
  • Winter, L., & Uleman, J. S. (1984). When are social judgments made? Evidence for the spontaneousness of trait inferences. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 47, 237-252.[CrossRef][ISI][Medline] [Order article via Infotrieve]

Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati    What's this?


This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 Group Processes Intergroup RelationsHome page
A. Coull, V. Y. Yzerbyt, E. Castano, M.-P. Paladino, and V. Leemans
Protecting the Ingroup: Motivated Allocation of Cognitive Resources in the Presence of Threatening Ingroup Members
Group Processes Intergroup Relations, October 1, 2001; 4(4): 327 - 339.
[Abstract] [PDF]

This Article
Right arrow Abstract Freely available
Right arrow Free Full Text (Free PDF) Free
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Right arrow Citation Map
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to Saved Citations
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow Add to My Marked Citations
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via HighWire
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Moreno, K. N.
Right arrow Articles by Bodenhausen, G. V.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati  
What's this?