Social Judgement
Prejudice
Prejudice involves attitude and emotional feeling towards a member of a certain group and can be in multiple forms, including fear and anxiety. Prejudice is distinct to both discrimination and stereotypes. Discrimination incorporates preferential treatment based on group membership. Distinction divides to interpersonal and organizational discrimination. Interpersonal discrimination combines individuals and may lead to an inferior and mixed feeling among group members. It also includes discrimination, attitude and beliefs. Organizational discrimination consists of the formal guidelines in an organization with discrimination outcomes. Other forms of discrimination include institutional and cultural bias. However, according to Baston and Vosgerau (2016), stereotype associates attributes, including the behaviour of a member of a defined group. Stereotype may result in prejudice when an individual develops a behavioural belief on a member of a particular group.
Prejudice results from various factors, including socialization, behaviour, economic elements, and personality. Socialization combines the immediate family, neighbours, friends, and media content such as advertisement. The media bias conceptualization on individual people as black, females, and their sexual orientation, promotes prejudice. Conforming behaviour to win the approval of others is another factor creating prejudice in the community. There could be pressure from friends, family members, and colleagues to acknowledge their beliefs and views. Because, of financial and social stress as economic elements, there is competition among group members which can result in prejudice. Although socialization influences prejudice among individuals, an individual’s personality determines how they may be prone to fear or prejudice. For example, the authoritarian personality acknowledges the superiority of specific individuals and the inferiority of others. The authoritarian personality relies on parenting. However, prejudice is manageable through ambitions, including becoming more conversant, cooperative, and unbiased economic and social support of the society.
Groups
A group combines individuals depending and interacting with each other. Group cohesion refers to social practice featuring the forces bring group members together. There are various factors influencing group cohesion, including the size of the group, similarities among members, competition and risk factors, and group success and difficulties (Markman, 2015). Few individuals in a group have a higher probability of agreeing with each other; therefore, small groups are more cohesive than the larger groups. Group members with similar attributes such as ethnicity, principles, and attitude promote agreement among the members, which in turn increases group cohesion. Stiff completion from external groups increases a group cohesion because the members could understand that overcoming group challenges, there should be a mutual agreement among the group members. Group success and difficulty on entry influences group cohesion through increasing membership and reinforcement of identity of group members. Also, the more the group entry is severe, the more motivated are the members to stay in it.
Attitude and Behavior
Individuals belong to various social, economic, racial, age, and gender groups. The groups are the essence of self-esteem and identity. Therefore, groups give individuals a sense of belonging. Groups have a distinct interest, features, and social roles. Because a group offers a sense of belonging to its members, there is a likelihood of prejudice and stereotype to other group members. For example, some groups may conceptualize other group members as superior, inferior, weak, and reliable. As such, group membership affects an individual’s behaviour through transgressor and transgression judgement in determining moral ethics. From children moral transgression judgement, they are capable of identifying the level of conduct worthy of punishment. Also, people on discouraging disagreement with other group members, they tend to conform to the converging behaviours. Thus, group membership influences attitude, ethics, and social judgment.
Influence of Social Perception on Stereotyping
Cultural, ethical, and social groups’ media conceptualization influences social approach of the group and advocates stereotyping. According to Sonnet et al. (2015), media content from both the internal and outside of the organization have a significant influence on racism. Although various media outlets have employed people of colour, they have whites on the reporting and anchoring positions. In addition to this, media content creation involves different individuals, including video editors and narrators. The content creation reflects implicit racism in media stations through news productions. For example, in FOX, CNN, and CBS news employ all-white narrative in their news production. There is the coding of visual and verbal themes in communication which are diverse in divergence and redundancy. On the media, there is the juxtaposition of the black people as violent and white people moving the black victims on wheelchair illustrates how media perpetuates stereotypes.
Cognitive Dissonance and Subtle Stereotyping Effect on Social Change
Cognitive dissonance involves inconsistent beliefs, traits, and attitude. Subtle stereotyping combines the automatic bias reaction of an individual: both cognitive dissonance and subtle stereotyping influence social change capability. Primarily, cognitive dissonance is a result of effort, induced compliance behaviour, and decision making. Social context is inclusive of work, family, and social organization. Because of cognitive dissonance featuring conflicting beliefs and attitude, it influences political and social governance. According to Vraga (2015), politics and democracy combine conflicts. Through the periodic political election, different politicians representing various parties propose distinct visions for the country and contesting -techniques applicable in achieving these goals. In response to this, individuals have arising dissonance, thereby considering their political identity and attitude during an election. Therefore, altering social change.
Ethical Challenges Researchers Face
On researching contentious topics, researchers face various ethical challenges. It is worth noting that research ethics are fundamental in reinforcing the aim, values, responsibility, and trust of a researcher. Some of the ethics in research include integrity, confidentiality, objectivity, and legality. Researchers and participant in social psychology face both physical and psychological harm. Besides, detecting psychological damage on both researchers and participant is a problematic exercise. Researchers are to ensure that their findings are confidential. Breach of information jeopardizes the essence of research. Another challenge researcher’s face is informed consent. Before the study, a researcher should ensure there is consent from the participant. There are instances when a researcher has approval from a misinformed participant. Other ethical challenges include debriefing and deception. The impossibility of debriefing increases the occurrence of exposure to harm, informed consent, and breaching of information. Also, some studies encourage deception which associates misleading the participant.
Implications of Prejudice and Stereotype
However, ignoring to address stereotype and prejudice have multiple implications and consequences. Because prejudice and stereotype, according to Baston and Vosgerau (2016), influence beliefs and attitudes; it affects academic performance, work experience, and behaviour. Therefore, individuals at school would always feel inferior compared to members of a particular group. Also, individuals develop psychological disorders like aggression, inability to focus, and making rational decisions. An individual who experienced prejudice, after the incidence, they will still experience lingering impact on their lives. Failure to address prejudice and stereotype may result in lack of self-control and low self-esteem among individuals.
References
Baston, R., & Vosgerau, G. (2016). Implicit attitudes and implicit prejudices. Philosophical Psychology, 29(6), 889-903.
Sonnett, J., Johnson, K. A., & Dolan, M. K. (2015, June). Priming implicit racism in television news: visual and verbal limitations on diversity. In Sociological Forum (Vol. 30, No. 2, pp. 328-347).
Kimmel, A. J. (2017). CHAPTER 3, Ethical Issues in Social Influence Research. The Oxford Handbook of Social Influence, 11.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781412976190.n3
Markman, A. (2015). How groups shape individual judgement. Greater Good Magazine. Accessed from https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_groups_shape_judgment
Vraga, E. K. (2015). How party affiliation conditions the experience of dissonance and explains polarization and selective exposure. Social Science Quarterly, 96(2), 487-502.