Title: From attitudes to (in)action: the darker side of ‘we’
Abstract: The study of intergroup relations has traditionally focused on the role of individual prejudice in motivating discrimination and creating disparities. Prejudice has been classically defined as a negative attitude, in Allport’s (1954) terms ‘an antipathy based on faulty and inflexible generalization. It may be felt or expressed. It may be directed toward a group as a whole, or toward an individual because he [sic] is a member of that group’ (p. 9). Over the past fifty years, in particular, psychologists have invested considerable energy in exploring how interventions, such as appropriately structured intergroup contact, can reduce prejudice (Pettigrew and Tropp, 2006). In addition, stimulated by the classic work of Tajfel and Turner (1979), recent approaches have also examined how group perceptions and identity can influence intergroup prejudice (Brown, 1996) and inform strategies for reducing bias (Gaertner and Dovidio, 2010). Extending the line of analysis presented by Wright and Baray in the previous chapter, this chapter acknowledges the benefits of these frameworks for improving intergroup attitudes and relieving immediate tensions but also suggests that such approaches, in isolation, may have unintended consequences that inhibit action by members of disadvantaged and advantaged groups towards social structural changes towards equality in the longer term.
Publication Year: 2012
Publication Date: 2012-01-12
Language: en
Type: book-chapter
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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Cited By Count: 20
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