Aversive Form of Racism

1
Aversive Form of Racism

• Samuel Gaertner John Dovidio

2
Historical Change

• White attitudes less racist, more tolerant
• Subtle, indirect prejudice continues
• Racist feelings and beliefs among white
  Americans are generally the rule rather than the
  exception.

3
Aversive Racists

• Sympathize with victims of past injustice
• Support policies for promoting equality
• Still possess negative feelings beliefs
• Cognitive basis in info processing (blacks assoc.
  with poverty, crime, welfare)
• Not hostility or hatred, but discomfort,
  uneasiness, disgust, and sometimes fear.
• Unable to recognize institutional racism

4
Question

• Gaertner Dovidio cite Kovel on aversive
  racism
• But is this aversive racism or how attitudes
  work in conditions of metaracism?

5
Studiespro-social behavior

• Wrong-number phone calls
• Anagram task
• Cognitive ability task
• Bystander helping
• Adjective association

6
Wrong-number calls
Black vs. White callers asked S-s to call car
garage
Black White
Conservatives help 65 92
Liberals help (n.s.) 75 85
Conservatives hang up 8 5
Liberals hang up 19 3
7
Interpretation

• Conservatives blatant prejudice
• Liberals
• where norms strong (after hearing request), no
  prejudice
• Before norms come into effect, prejudice

8
Anagram Helping Task
White vs. black student confederates ask S-s
for help

• Design 2 x 2 x 2 factorial -- white S-s
• White vs. black student confederates
• Internal cause (failure to work hard) vs.
  external cause (difficulty of task)
• First party request vs. 3rd party request
• Dependent Variable White S-s help or dont help
  confederate

9
Anagram Helping Task

• Results
• External cause equal helping
• 3rd party request equal helping
• Internal cause
• self-request 73 whites helped
• 33 blacks helped

10
Interpretation

• Where norms for helping salient --external cause
  bystander request -- helping not discriminatory
• Where norms for helping not salient --internal
  cause, self-request -- helping is discriminatory.

11
Cognitive Task Help-Seeking
Black / white partners offer help S-s may ask
for help.

• Design 2 x 2 white S-s
• Black vs. white partners (confederates)
• Help offered vs. help sought
• Results
• Offered 80 S-s accepted from black
• 55 S-s accepted from white
• Solicited 40 S-s asked help from black
• 60 S-s asked help from white

12
Interpretation

• When black asks for help, both hi-prejudice
  low-prejudice subjects help
• When norms for helping strong, helping not
  discriminatory
• Note Interaction Effect S helps black more
  than white when asked, S asks whites more than
  blacks for help

13
Status and Helping

• Were skipping this experiment!

14
Bystander Helping
White bystanders may help white or black victim.

• Background
• Darley Latane paradigm
• More bystanders less help
• Design 2 x 2 White S-s
• Chairs fall on confed during ESP exp
• White vs. Black victims
• Subject alone vs. with other bystanders

15
Bystander Helping Results

• Victim alone
• S-s help 94 of blacks vs. 81 of whites (n.s.)
• Victim with bystanders
• S-s help 38 of blacks vs. 75 of whites

16
Jury Simulartion Experiment

• Were skipping this one,too!

17
Adjective Association Task
White students try to recognize words.

• Task decide whether string of letters is a word
• Measure reaction time
• Design 2 x 2 White S-s
• Positive vs. negative adjectives
• Paired with whites or blacks

18
Adjective Assoc. Task Results

• Negative adjectives
• No differences paired w/ whites or blacks
• Positive adjectives
• Faster reactions when paired w/ whites than
  blacks
• No difs between hi- low-prejudice S-s
• Whites associate positive traits with whites

19
Association Priming Study

• Were skipping this one too!

20
Conclusions

• Helping behavior
• Where norms for helping clear strong, whites do
  not discriminate
• Where norms ambiguous or weak, whites do
  discriminate

21
Conclusions

• Associations
• Blacks not evaluated as more lazy, stupid, or
  dirty
• Whites evaluated as more ambitious, smart and
  clean

22
Conclusions

• In most studies, high-prejudice whites and
  low-prejudice whites dont differ much in their
  behavior.

23
Conclusions

• Prejudiced thinking and discrimination still
  exist, but the contemporary forms are more
  subtle, more indirect, and less overtly
  negative
• The contemporary form of prejudice is
  expressed in ways that protect and perpetuate a
  nonprejudiced, non-discriminating self-image.

24
Conclusions

• Attempts to educate people to accept
  egalitarian ideals would have little impact on
  aversive racists
• Like a virus that mutates into new forms,
  old-fashioned prejudice seems to have evolved
  into a new type that is, at least temporarily,
  resistant to traditional attitude-change
  remedies

25
Questions

• Interpretation
• Is salience strength of norms a crucial
  factor?
• Concept of aversive racism
• Prejudice but conforms to P.C. norms?
• Anti-prejudice but succumbs to stereotypes