Construing and constructing others: On the reality and the generality of the behavioral confirmation scenario (original) (raw)
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Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 1997
It is now well-established that stereotypes can become activated unintentionally and outside of awareness by the presence of the relevant group features. There is also a long tradition of theory and evidence that perceptual and behavioral processes are intimately related (e.g., Berkowitz, 1984; James, 1890; Piaget, 1948). Considering these two phenomena together suggests that stereotype activation can cause the perceiver to act in stereotype-consistent ways, and recent evidence confirms this prediction (Bargh, Chen, & Burrows, 1996). The present study extended these findings by showing that the perceiver's stereotype-consistent behavior causes the target person to reciprocate in kind, thereby confirming the perceiver's stereotypic beliefs. Compared to a control condition, subliminal activation of the African American stereotype in participants resulted in greater hostility in their interaction partners (as rated by outside judges) and more extreme hostility ratings of the targets by their perceiver partner. 1997 Academic Press One important function of social schemas and related forms of knowledge structures is to fill in missing information about a person or event and to generate expectancies about what is going to happen next (e.g.
Behavioral confirmation in social interaction: From social perception to social reality
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 1978
A perceiver's actions, although based upon initially erroneous beliefs about a target individual may channel social interaction in ways that cause the behavior of the target to confirm the perceiver's beliefs. To chart this process of behavioral confirmation, we observed successive interactions between one target and two perceivers. In the first interaction, targets who interacted with perceivers who anticipated hostile partners displayed greater behavioral hostility than targets whose perceivers expected nonhostile partners. Only when targets regarded their actions as reflections of personal dispositions did these behavioral differences in hostility persevere into their subsequent interactions with naive perceivers who had no prior knowledge about them. Theoretical implications of the behavioral confirmation construct for social perception processes are discussed. If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences. W. I. Thomas
Non-conscious Behavioral Confirmation Process
1997
It is now well-established that stereotypes can become activated unintentionally and outside of awareness by the presence of the relevant group features. There is also a long tradition of theory and evidence that perceptual and behavioral processes are intimately related (e.g., Berkowitz, 1984; James, 1890; Piaget, 1948). Considering these two phenomena together suggests that stereotype activation can cause the perceiver to act in stereotype-consistent ways, and recent evidence confirms this prediction (Bargh, Chen, & Burrows, 1996). The present study extended these findings by showing that the perceiver's stereotype-consistent behavior causes the target person to reciprocate in kind, thereby confirming the perceiver's stereotypic beliefs. Compared to a control condition, subliminal activation of the African American stereotype in participants resulted in greater hostility in their interaction partners (as rated by outside judges) and more extreme hostility ratings of the targets by their perceiver partner. 1997 Academic Press One important function of social schemas and related forms of knowledge structures is to fill in missing information about a person or event and to generate expectancies about what is going to happen next (e.g.
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Many studies have been conducted to determine the degree to which people (targets) may be induced to behave in ways which are consistent with a perceiver's expectations (behavioral confirmation), and the degree to which people may resist behaving in ways which are inconsistent with their self-concepts (self-verification). These seemingly opposing tendencies, and the effects of social status on their occurrence, were systematically investigated in a replication and extension of an influential behavioral confirmation study. Seventy-two college students participated in a division-of-labor task. Crossing actual and perceived sex of the target, we explored the gender-stereotyped nature of participant preferences for masculine, feminine, and gender-neutral tasks. The results failed to replicate the behavioral confirmation effect in women, and found no evidence for such an effect in men; regardless of their perceived sex, both groups showed self-verification of their gender self-concept. Social status was found to have a negligible effect on when self-verification occurs. The generality of behavioral confirmation phenomena and explanatory ability of self-verification theory are discussed.
Previous research has shown that trait concepts and stereotypes become active automatically in the presence of relevant behavior or stereotyped-group features. Through the use of the same priming procedures as in previous impression formation research, Experiment 1 showed that participants whose concept of rudeness was primed interrupted the experimenter more quickly and frequently than did participants primed with polite-related stimuli. In Experiment 2, participants for whom an elderly stereotype was primed walked more slowly down the hallway when leaving the experiment than did control participants, consistent with the content of that stereotype. In Experiment 3, participants for whom the African American stereotype was primed subliminally reacted with more hostility to a vexatious request of the experimenter. Implications of this automatic behavior priming effect for self-fulfilling prophecies are discussed, as is whether social behavior is necessarily mediated by conscious choice processes.
2014
These experiments examined how social interactions with individuals who ostensibly have stereotype-relevant views affect the self-evaluations of stereotype targets. Participants believed they were going to interact, or actually interacted, with a person who ostensibly had stereotype-consistent or stereotype-inconsistent views about their social group. Consistent with shared reality theory, participants ’ self-evaluations (Experiments 1, 2, and 3) and behavior (Experiment 2) corresponded with the ostensible views of the other person when affiliative motivation was high. This occurred even when it was likely to be detrimental to participants ’ nonaffiliative outcomes (Experiment 3). Experiment 4 showed that self-evaluative shift away from the ostensible views of another person was a function of social distance motives, also consistent with shared reality theory.
Dynamics in the Contents of Self-Stereotyping and its Implication in Inter-Group Relations
Social psychology and society , 2021
Developing a comprehensive model to understand intergroup relationship through integrating two constructs usually used to be examined discretely; self-stereotyping and stereotyping. Background. Today's understanding of intergroup behavior is firmly grounded in concepts related to stereotypes. In literature, apparently, there are, two dominant approaches in studying stereotype's effect on intergroup relations. The first approach focuses on the effect of dominant group's stereotype on intergroup relation, while the second approach focuses on studying the impacts of self stereotyping on victims. Furthermore, minority groups' self-sterotyping is considered to be derived from the dominant groups' stereotype. As a result, the prevailing approaches are insensitive to the dynamics in self-stereotype and its implication to the intergroup relationship. In this article, it is claimed that the etiology of intergroup behavior could be better understood by considering a mutually interacting groups' perspective. Methodology. Systematic approach of reviewing the prevailing literature pertaining to stereotyping and self-stereotyping and integrative analysis method to develop new perspective. Conclusion. Intergroup relation involves the interaction of two or more groups each of them having stereotypes regarding their own group and outgroup. Thus, in this paper, we argued that, the etiology of intergroup behavior cannot be adequately understood without employing the belief system of mutually interacting groups. Hence, we integrated self-stereotyping and other's stereotypes and the behaviors that emerge during intergroup relations is predicted using the dynamics in the content/valence of minority group members' self-stereotyping simultaneously with the dominant groups' stereotype. The integration of these two approaches appears to offer the most adequate explanation for the complex nature of intergroup behavior.
The "saying is repeating" effect: dyadic communication can generate cultural stereotypes
The Journal of social psychology
It has been long established that interpersonal communication underpins the existence of cultural stereotypes. However, research has either examined the formation of new or the maintenance of existing stereotypes. In a series of three studies, the present research bridges the gap between these phases by showing that newly formed stereotypes can spread through repeated dyadic communication with others. The stereotypic representation arose due to the audience tuning in to communication to a first audience. Further transmission to two types of subsequent audiences was simulated: a newcomer and an old-timer with an unknown attitude towards the target. A "saying-is-repeating" effect was obtained: the stereotypic representation was invariably transmitted to the newcomer, regardless of whether communicators personally believed in the bias; perceived group-level consensus moderated its transmission to the old-timer. These findings demonstrate that once a stereotypic representation...