Dehumanization and self-reported proclivity to torture prisoners of war

Viki, G. Tendayi; Osgood, Daniel E.; Phillips, Sabine

doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2012.11.006

Cited by 133 publications

(112 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…These findings seem to run counter to the literature that has linked dehumanization to willingness to punish, torture, rape, and kill out-groups, women, and minorities (51)(52)(53)(54). In this tradition, even our enemies and other "thin" relations must be perceived as human to prevent excessive violence toward them (55).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 61%

Dehumanization increases instrumental violence, but not moral violence

Tage

Valdesolo

Graham

2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

136

100

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Across five experiments, we show that dehumanization-the act of perceiving victims as not completely human-increases instrumental, but not moral, violence. In attitude surveys, ascribing reduced capacities for cognitive, experiential, and emotional states to victims predicted support for practices where victims are harmed to achieve instrumental goals, including sweatshop labor, animal experimentation, and drone strikes that result in civilian casualties, but not practices where harm is perceived as morally righteous, including capital punishment, killing in war, and drone strikes that kill terrorists. In vignette experiments, using dehumanizing compared with humanizing language increased participants' willingness to harm strangers for money, but not participants' willingness to harm strangers for their immoral behavior. Participants also spontaneously dehumanized strangers when they imagined harming them for money, but not when they imagined harming them for their immoral behavior. Finally, participants humanized strangers who were low in humanity if they imagined harming them for immoral behavior, but not money, suggesting that morally motivated perpetrators may humanize victims to justify violence against them. Our findings indicate that dehumanization enables violence that perpetrators see as unethical, but instrumentally beneficial. In contrast, dehumanization does not contribute to moral violence because morally motivated perpetrators wish to harm complete human beings who are capable of deserving blame, experiencing suffering, and understanding its meaning.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 61%

Dehumanization increases instrumental violence, but not moral violence

Tage

Valdesolo

Graham

2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

136

100

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Biased evaluations of outgroups reflect more dehumanization (Cehajic, Brown, & Gonzalez, 2009; Viki, Osgood, & Phillips, 2013). However, it is easier to escalate violence if a group is perceived as a homogeneous mass of people (Keen, 1986; Mullen & Hu, 1989).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Configural face processing impacts race disparities in humanization and trust

Cassidy

Krendl

Stanko

et al. 2017

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology

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The dehumanization of Black Americans is an ongoing societal problem. Reducing configural face processing, a well-studied aspect of typical face encoding, decreases the activation of human-related concepts to White faces, suggesting that the extent that faces are configurally processed contributes to dehumanization. Because Black individuals are more dehumanized relative to White individuals, the current work examined how configural processing might contribute to their greater dehumanization. Study 1 showed that inverting faces (which reduces configural processing) reduced the activation of human-related concepts toward Black more than White faces. Studies 2a and 2b showed that reducing configural processing affects dehumanization by decreasing trust and increasing homogeneity among Black versus White faces. Studies 3a–d showed that configural processing effects emerge in racial outgroups for whom untrustworthiness may be a more salient group stereotype (i.e., Black, but not Asian, faces). Study 4 provided evidence that these effects are specific to reduced configural processing versus more general perceptual disfluency. Reduced configural processing may thus contribute to the greater dehumanization of Black relative to White individuals.

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“…Nonetheless, many Americans support torture-and some invoke the information payoff from torture as a reason (Janoff-Bulman, 2007;Pew Research Center, 2014). Although a considerable amount of research has examined support for torture and moral evaluations of torture (e.g., Tarrant et al, 2012;Viki, Osgood, & Phillips, 2013), relatively few studies have examined perceptions of information payoff and torture efficacy (though see, e.g., Crandall, Eidelman, Skitka, & Morgan, 2009).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%