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The formation of stereotypes and their effect on behaviour (8)…
The formation of stereotypes and their effect on behaviour (8)
INTRODUCTION
presents us with too much information
our capacity too process information is limited
our social world is very complex
so our social world needs to be simplified
1 way to avoid information overload = social categorisation
examples: gender, race, politcal stances, personality
generalisation can be +/-
negative example = women are weak, jewish people are greedy
stereotype = mental representation + form of categorisation about a specific individual / group of people
once a set of characteristics are attributed to a person, they are often applied to all members of the group
positive example = christians are kind, asians are intelligent
several theories addressing how stereotypes form
CONCLUSION
common to evaluate + generalise a group of people
stereotypes simplify our social world
can lead to discrimination + prejudice
evidence for illusory correlation between size of group + formation of stereotypes
most often negatively affect our behaviour
HAMILTON + GIFFORD (1976)
A = majority group
Method:
pp's asked to read descriptions about 2 made up groups (A+B)
B = minority group
Aim:
investigate illusory correlation of group size + negative behaviour
18 + and 8 - behaviours
9 + and 4 - behaviours
pp's asked to attribute behaviours to groups
Outcome:
pp's has illusory correlation
undesirable behaviours were attributed to minority group (B)
Conclusion:
distinctive information draws attention
eg. B's negative behaviours were distinctly numerically fewer
they argued that people see a relationship between 2 variables even when there is none