An examination of resource-based and fit-based theories of stereotyping under cognitive load and fit

Abstract

Should stereotyping be characterised as an act of cognitive miserliness of one of rational meaning-seeking? This paper uses a cognitive load paradigm to investigate the adequacy of popular resource-based explanations of stereotyping in comparison to an alternative ®t-based or meaning-based explanation. In Experiment 1, load was increased by means of concurrent tasks within a highly ®tting context (where targets generally behaved in a stereotype-consistent fashion). A linear decrease in stereotyping resulted as measured by category confusions on a who-said what recognition task (Taylor, Fiske, Etco & Ruderman, 1978). This outcome is inconsistent with a resource-based analysis of stereotyping. Experiment 2 manipulated load as stimulus exposure time. Although load was successfully imposed in this second experiment, stereotyping neither increased nor decreased as a function of load. The concept of cognitive load and the importance of ®t for the analysis of stereotyping are discussed.

The effect of cognitive load on social categorization in the category confusion paradigm

“…in terms of comparative and normative ®t). However, the results of Nolan et al (1999) suggest that such conditions do not necessarily give categorization an advantage under load. We deliberately excluded the possibility of detecting ®t in our research (at least as far as possible) for several reasons.…”

“…At least this appears to be the case where categorization is linked to the representation and organization of multiple exemplars and takes place under conditions where it is not facilitated by a high degree of stereotypic`®t' between the statements and the categories. Related to the last point, recent research has used the same category confusion paradigm to investigate social categorization processes under a high degree of stereotypic ®t (two thirds stereotypeconsistent information), and found very similar results, namely a decrease in the incidence of categorization as a function of load (Nolan, Haslam, Spears & Oakes, 1999). Even where familiar stereotypic content gives more meaning to the categories deployed, social categorization was undermined by load, rather than helping to manage load.…”

Preadolescents' categorization of gender and ethnicity at the subgroup level in memory

“…Furthermore, children and early adolescents may lack either the cognitive resources or the experience simultaneously to encode targets at two different hierarchical levels. Categorizing multiple targets seems to be an effortful process as cognitive load reduces adults' ability to categorize targets in statement matching paradigms (Nolan, Haslam, Spears, & Oakes, 1999; Spears, Haslam, & Jansen, 1999). The stimuli in these studies only varied along one dimension.…”

Social categorization and fit detection under cognitive load: efficient or effortful?

“…Unlike rating measures of stereotyping, the error-difference measure provides an unobtrusive, and some have argued, relatively unconfounded measure of category salience (e.g. Nolan, Haslam, Spears, & Oakes, 1999;Park, Wolsko, & Judd, 2001;Spears, Haslam, & Jansen, 1999).…”

“…In this view, load should be particularly detrimental when inter-category fit is given, but in the studies by Spears et al (1999) and Klauer and Wegener (1998) there was no inter-category fit. Nolan et al (1999) followed up on these criticisms and conducted two studies that manipulated load using less accessible occupational categories. Target persons were three female doctors and three female hairdressers.…”