Chapter 9: Prejudice: Disliking Others (2947.0K) - Bad Request

340 Part Three Social Relations
group-serving bias
Explaining away outgroup
members’ positive behaviors;
also attributing negative
behaviors to their dispositions
(while excusing such behavior
by one’s own group).
Just-world thinking? Some
people argued against giving
legal rights to American
prisoners in the Guantanamo
Bay detention camp that
housed alleged combatants
from Afghanistan and Iraq.
One argument was that these
people would not be confined
there if they had not done
horrendous things, so why
allow them to argue their
innocence in U.S. courts?
attributed men’s and women’s behavior solely to their presumed innate dispositions.
The more people assume that human traits are fixed dispositions, the stronger
are their stereotypes and the greater their acceptance of racial inequities (Levy
& others, 1998; Williams & Eberhardt, 2008).
GROUP-SERVING BIAS
Thomas Pettigrew (1979, 1980) showed how attribution errors bias people’s explanations
of group members’ behaviors. We grant members of our own group the
benefit of the doubt: “She donated because she has a good heart; he refused because
he’s using every penny to help support his mother.” When explaining acts by members
of other groups, we more often assume the worst: “She donated to gain favor;
he refused because he’s selfish.” In one classic study, the light shove that Whites
perceived as mere “horsing around” when done by another White became a “violent
gesture” when done by a Black (Duncan, 1976).
Positive behavior by outgroup members is more often dismissed. It may be
seen as a “special case” (“He is certainly bright and hardworking—not at all like
other . . .”), as owing to luck or some special advantage (“She probably got admitted
just because her med school had to fill its quota for women applicants”), as
demanded by the situation (“Under the circumstances, what could the cheap Scot
do but pay the whole check?”), or as attributable to extra effort (“Asian students get
better grades because they’re so compulsive”). Disadvantaged groups and groups
that stress modesty (such as the Chinese) exhibit less of this group-serving bias
(Fletcher & Ward, 1989; Heine & Lehman, 1997; Jackson & others, 1993). Social psychologists
Jacquie Vorauer and Stacey Sasaki (2010, 2011) note that multiculturalism’s
focus on differences, which can be positive in the absence of conflict (making
intergroup exchanges seem interesting and stimulating), sometimes comes at a
cost. When there is conflict or threat, a focus on differences can foster group-level
attributions and increased hostility.