‘The Queen Mother and I’: assimilation, contrast, and attitudes toward social groups

Abstract

We examined whether social group attitudes are subject to context eects. It was hypothesised that manipulating the context in which a group exemplar was rendered accessible would produce dierent eects when subjects were subsequently asked to evaluate the exemplar's group. In our study, all subjects ®rst expressed their opinion about the (popular) Queen Mother before indicating their attitude toward the British Royal Family. In the`non-redundant' condition, the two questions were structured such that the Queen Mother was expected to be included in individuals' representation of the Royal Family, leading to a high correlation between the two judgements and a favourable evaluation of the group. Conversely, in the`redundant' condition, the questions were structured such that the Queen Mother was expected to be excluded from individuals' representation of the Royal Family, leading to a lower correlation between the judgements and a less favourable evaluation of the group. The results supported the hypothesis, and are consistent with the Schwarz and Bless (1992a,b) inclusion/exclusion model of assimilation and contrast.

Making a Party Leader Less of a Party Member: The Impact of Ambivalence on Assimilation and Contrast Effects in Political Party Attitudes

“…Overall, the correlation between the two responses was significantly higher in the nonredundant condition (r = .63) than in the redundant condition (r = .49). The difference between these correlations was significant (z = 1.65, p < .05) and replicates previous research (e.g., Haddock & Carrick, 1999;Schwarz et al, 1991). However, the interaction between condition and ambivalence was also significant (z = 1.92, p < .05).…”

Expecting to Meet a Rape Victim Affects Women’s Self-Esteem: The Moderating Role of Rape Myth Acceptance

“…In this condition, participants subsequently evaluated Christian Democratic politicians less positively compared to the control condition where von Weizsäcker had not been mentioned. This finding suggests that participants excluded information about von Weizsäcker from the target category (for related findings see Haddock & Carrick, 1999;Stapel & Schwarz, 1998; for further discussion see Bohner, 1998).…”