Clarifying the Role of Perception in Intergroup Relations: Origins of Bias, Components of Perception, and Practical Implications

Xiao, Yi; Coppin, Géraldine; Bavel, Jay J. Van

doi:10.1080/1047840x.2016.1237822

Cited by 12 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 62 publications

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“…Taken together, these results are conceptually consistent with work on the malleability of social perception in general (Van Bavel et al, 2013; Xiao & Van Bavel, 2012; Xiao et al, 2016a, 2016b), and disruptions in the typical social perception of marginalized individuals in particular (Fincher & Tetlock, 2016; Fincher et al, 2017). Black individuals are more likely to be misperceived in terms of their emotional expressions (Hugenberg & Bodenhausen, 2003; Hugenberg, 2005), their mental agency (Cassidy et al, 2017), their size (Wilson et al, 2017), their speed (Kenrick et al, 2016), and, as we’ve demonstrated, their experience of pain.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

Perceptual contributions to racial bias in pain recognition.

Mende-Siedlecki¹,

Qu-Lee²,

Backer³

et al. 2019

Journal of Experimental Psychology: General

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The pain of Black Americans is systematically underdiagnosed and undertreated, compared to the pain of their White counterparts. Extensive research has examined the psychological factors that might account for such biases, including status judgments, racial prejudice, and stereotypes about biological differences between Blacks and Whites. Across seven experiments, we accumulated evidence that lower-level perceptual processes also uniquely contribute to downstream racial biases in pain recognition. We repeatedly observed that White participants showed more stringent thresholds for perceiving pain on Black faces, compared to White faces. A tendency to see painful expressions on Black faces less readily arose, in part, from a disruption in configural processing associated with other-race faces. Subsequent analyses revealed that this racial bias in pain perception could not be easily attributed to stimulus features (e.g., color, luminance, or contrast), subjective evaluations related to pain tolerance and experience (e.g., masculinity, dominance, etc.), or objective differences in face structure and expression intensity between Black and White faces. Finally, we observed that racial biases in perception facilitated biases in pain treatment decisions, and that this relationship existed over and above biased judgments of status and strength, explicit racial bias, and endorsement of false beliefs regarding biological differences. A meta-analysis across 9 total experiments (N = 1,289) confirmed the robustness and size of these effects. This research establishes a subtle, albeit influential, perceptual pathway to intergroup bias in pain care and treatment. Implications for racial bias, face perception, and medical treatment are discussed.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

Perceptual contributions to racial bias in pain recognition.

Mende-Siedlecki¹,

Qu-Lee²,

Backer³

et al. 2019

Journal of Experimental Psychology: General

Self Cite

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“…Our results demonstrate that minimal group-bias extends even when no obvious social content (e.g., faces) is present. It may be that this fundamental bias in categorising social information may serve as the foundation for higher-level ingroup bias effects (e.g., a perceptual model of intergroup relations 52 ). For example, greater cognitive resources allocated to ingroup stimuli may then cause better differentiation of ingroup and outgroup members in facial processing.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Overlap in processing advantages for minimal ingroups and the self

Enock

Hewstone

Lockwood

2020

Sci Rep

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Cognitive biases shape our perception of the world and our interactions with other people. Information related to the self and our social ingroups is prioritised for cognitive processing and can therefore form some of these key biases. However, ingroup biases may be elicited not only for established social groups, but also for minimal groups assigned by novel or random social categorisation. Moreover, whether these ‘ingroup biases’ are related to self-processing is unknown. Across three experiments, we utilised a social associative matching paradigm to examine whether the cognitive mechanisms underpinning the effects of minimal groups overlapped with those that prioritise the self, and whether minimal group allocation causes early processing advantages. We found significant advantages in response time and sensitivity (dprime) for stimuli associated with newly-assigned ingroups. Further, self-biases and ingroup-biases were positively correlated across individuals (Experiments 1 and 3). However, when the task was such that ingroup and self associations competed, only the self-advantage was detected (Experiment 2). These results demonstrate that even random group allocation quickly captures attention and enhances processing. Positive correlations between the self- and ingroup-biases suggest a common cognitive mechanism across individuals. These findings have implications for understanding how social biases filter our perception of the world.

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“…In contexts where race plays a significant role in group distinction, racial identity—and the multiple features of intergroup relations that covary with racial identity, such as majority/minority status—may provide an equally salient motivational guide for perception and behavior (including empathic responses) as group membership [ 36 , 37 ]. Yet, despite the efficacy of MGPs in modulating racial biases under certain conditions, most studies utilizing the MGP do not sufficiently take into account the social contexts in which social groups exist [ 32 – 36 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

(Not) part of the team: Racial empathy bias in a South African minimal group study

Deist

Fourie

2023

PLoS ONE

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Minimal Group Paradigm (MGP) research suggests that recategorization with an arbitrarily defined group may be sufficient to override empathy biases among salient social categories like race. However, most studies utilizing MGPs do not consider sufficiently the socio-historical contexts of social groups. Here we investigated whether the recategorization of White participants into arbitrarily defined mixed-race teams using a non-competitive MGP would ameliorate racial empathy biases towards ingroup team members in the South African context. Sixty participants rated their empathic and counter-empathic (Schadenfreude, Glückschmerz) responses to ingroup and outgroup team members in physically painful, emotionally distressing, and positive situations. As anticipated, results indicated significant ingroup team biases in empathic and counter-empathic responses. However, mixed-race minimal teams were unable to override ingroup racial empathy biases, which persisted across events. Interestingly, a manipulation highlighting purported political ideological differences between White and Black African team members did not exacerbate racial empathy bias, suggesting that such perceptions were already salient. Across conditions, an internal motivation to respond without prejudice was most strongly associated with empathy for Black African target individuals, regardless of their team status. Together, these results suggest that racial identity continues to provide a salient motivational guide in addition to more arbitrary group memberships, even at an explicit level, for empathic responding in contexts characterized by historical power asymmetry. These data further problematize the continued official use of race-based categories in such contexts.

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Clarifying the Role of Perception in Intergroup Relations: Origins of Bias, Components of Perception, and Practical Implications

Cited by 12 publications

References 62 publications

Perceptual contributions to racial bias in pain recognition.

Perceptual contributions to racial bias in pain recognition.

Overlap in processing advantages for minimal ingroups and the self

(Not) part of the team: Racial empathy bias in a South African minimal group study

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