Ecology-driven stereotypes override race stereotypes

Abstract

Why do race stereotypes take the forms they do? Life history theory posits that features of the ecology shape individuals' behavior. Harsh and unpredictable ("desperate") ecologies induce fast strategy behaviors such as impulsivity, whereas resource-sufficient and predictable ("hopeful") ecologies induce slow strategy behaviors such as future focus. We suggest that individuals possess a lay understanding of ecology's influence on behavior, resulting in ecology-driven stereotypes. Importantly, because race is confounded with ecology in the United States, we propose that Americans' stereotypes about racial groups actually reflect stereotypes about these groups' presumed home ecologies. Study 1 demonstrates that individuals hold ecology stereotypes, stereotyping people from desperate ecologies as possessing faster life history strategies than people from hopeful ecologies. Studies 2-4 rule out alternative explanations for those findings. Study 5, which independently manipulates race and ecology information, demonstrates that when provided with information about a person's race (but not ecology), individuals' inferences about blacks track stereotypes of people from desperate ecologies, and individuals' inferences about whites track stereotypes of people from hopeful ecologies. However, when provided with information about both the race and ecology of others, individuals' inferences reflect the targets' ecology rather than their race: black and white targets from desperate ecologies are stereotyped as equally fast life history strategists, whereas black and white targets from hopeful ecologies are stereotyped as equally slow life history strategists. These findings suggest that the content of several predominant race stereotypes may not reflect race, per se, but rather inferences about how one's ecology influences behavior. Traits such as these have long characterized white Americans' stereotypes of black Americans (1-3). Why do race stereotypes in the United States take these particular forms?Stereotypes are useful to the extent they can rapidly provide perceivers with information about the affordances-threats and opportunities-posed by others (4). Indeed, a major function of the mind is to identify and anticipate affordances and to respond to them in ways that are threat reducing and opportunity enhancing so that we may more successfully achieve our goals (5-10). However, because we cannot directly see others' behavioral intentions, strategies, or capacities, we must infer them (imperfectly) from cues we can perceive. Here, we argue that one such cue is an individual's home ecology, because ecologies shape the behavior of those within them. Thus, by knowing another's home ecology, people possess useful information (in the form of stereotypes) about others' behavioral intentions, strategies, and capacities. To the extent that different races are associated with different home ecologies, an individual's race becomes a secondary cue to his or her ecology, with the implication that race may evoke ecology-driven stereot...

Racialized physical space as cultural product

“…Recent work provides evidence that person‐focused racial stereotypes may derive from race–space associations. In the absence of information about a target's home environment, people tend to assume that White Americans come from resource‐sufficient, stable ecologies and that Black Americans come from resource‐lacking, unpredictable ecologies (Neuberg & Sng, ; Williams, Sng, & Neuberg, ). The authors argue that perceivers develop person‐focused racial stereotypes in part by thinking of the behaviors that are optimal for these stereotypic home environments.…”

“…The authors argue that perceivers develop person‐focused racial stereotypes in part by thinking of the behaviors that are optimal for these stereotypic home environments. Accordingly, they suggest that Blacks are stereotyped to be more impulsive and opportunistic than Whites, at least in part because these divergent behaviors are adaptive in the ecology that each group is thought to inhabit (Williams et al, ). Supporting Williams' and colleagues' claim, differences in how people perceived Black and White targets' behaviors went away when participants were told that these targets came from the same home ecology.…”

Religious People Are Trusted Because They Are Viewed as Slow Life-History Strategists

“…Social perceivers are keenly aware of the implications of LH strategy on their interactions with others, as they intuitively link LH cues (e.g., ecology) with suites of corresponding LH traits (Williams, Sng, & Neuberg, 2016). Because trust is highly related to cooperation (Simpson, 2007), one might expect individuals perceived as fast LH strategists to be considered poor cooperators and, thus, less trustworthy than those viewed as slow strategists.…”

Evolutionary Perspectives on Situations

“…So, although people of other races may serve as potentially powerful situational cues today (of opportunities for intergroup conflict or cooperation, etc. ), this cognition is operating on psychological architecture that evolved to serve other purposes, such as to detect who belongs to what group (Kurzban, Tooby, & Cosmides, 2001), or what kinds of environments people grew up in (Williams, Sng, & Neuberg, 2016).…”