Perspective taking and prejudice reduction: the mediational role of empathy arousal and situational attributions

Abstract

This research was designed to examine whether perspective taking promotes improved intergroup attitudes regardless of the extent that stereotypic perceptions of outgroups are endorsed, as well as examining the mechanisms (attributional or empathy related) by which perspective taking motivates improved intergroup attitudes. Participants were presented with an interview segment where an African American interviewee discussed the difficulties experienced as a result of his membership in a negatively stereotyped group. Materials were presented in a 2 (perspective taking: other focused or objective focused) Â 2 (target stereotypicality: confirming or disconfirming) between participants design. Findings revealed that the manipulation of target stereotypicality influenced subsequent stereotype endorsement; those exposed to a stereotype confirming target later endorsed more stereotypic perceptions of African Americans than did those exposed to a stereotype disconfirming target. However, perspective taking promoted improved intergroup attitudes irrespective of stereotypicality; those encouraged to adopt the perspective of the target later reported more favourable intergroup attitudes than did those who remained detached and objective listeners. Whereas empathy partially mediated the relation between perspective taking and intergroup attitudes, situational attributions were a stronger and more reliable mediator.

Perspective taking combats automatic expressions of racial bias.

“…First, we replicated the findings from Experiments 1 and 2 using a different measure of automatic evaluations. Second, we replicated previous research showing that perspective taking leads to more positive deliberate evaluations of African Americans as a group (e.g., Vescio et al, 2003). Third, we demonstrated that changes in automatic evaluations mediated changes in deliberate evaluations.…”

“…These findings are con- sistent with our prediction-derived from the attitudes literature (Neumann et al, 2003)-that the changes in automatic interracial evaluations found in Experiments 1-3 should translate to stronger approach reactions and weaker avoidance reactions to Black Americans. Furthermore, the effects of perspective taking were specific to Black targets (see also Batson, Polycarpou, et al, 1997;Shih et al, 2009;Vescio et al, 2003), suggesting that the results of the first three experiments are likely to reflect increased positivity toward Black Americans rather than increased negativity toward White Americans. Thus far, we have primarily examined the impact of perspective taking on intrapersonal dependent variables, albeit ones that should theoretically have noteworthy interpersonal consequences.…”

“…Alternatively, it is possible that adopting the perspective of a Black target simply heightens the motivation to be-or at least to appear to beunbiased (Plant & Devine, 1998) and that perspective taking, despite having benefits for self-reported interracial evaluations Vescio et al, 2003), exerts little effect on automatic interracial evaluations.…”

Solidarity through shared disadvantage: Highlighting shared experiences of discrimination improves relations between stigmatized groups.

“…Moreover, the benefits of shared experiences tend to generalize beyond the individual with whom one shares this experience, leading to a reduction in prejudice and stereotyping of this person's group as a whole (e.g., Batson, Early, & Salvarani, 1997;Broockman & Kalla, 2016;Galinsky & Ku, 2004;Galinsky & Moskowitz, 2000;Vescio, Sechrist, & Paolucci, 2003).…”

An appraisal theory of empathy and other vicarious emotional experiences.

“…Other research has demonstrated that perspective taking can decrease the actor-observer bias by increasing observers' situational attributions for actors' behavior, particularly for negative events APPRAISAL AND EMPATHY 46 (Betancourt, 1990;Galper, 1976;Gould & Sigall, 1977;Storms, 1973;Vescio, Sechrist, & Paolucci, 2003). When perspective taking manipulations are employed in typical compassion research paradigms, they might increase compassion by directing subjects' attention to situational causes of a target's misfortune.…”