Quoting Paul Auster

“It always stimulates me to discover new examples of my own prejudice and stupidity, to realize that I don't know half as much as I think I do.”
Paul Auster, Oracle Night

photograph of Paul Auster via

Empathy trumps prejudice: The longitudinal relation between empathy and anti-immigrant attitudes in adolescence

Abstract: Although research has shown the effects of empathy manipulations on prejudice, little is known about the long-term relation between empathy and prejudice development, the direction of effects, and the relative effects of cognitive and affective aspects of empathy. Moreover, research has not examined within-person processes; hence, its practical implications are unclear. In addition, longitudinal research on development of prejudice and empathy in adolescence is still scarce. 

This 3-wave study of adolescents (N = 574) examined a longitudinal, within-person relation between empathy and anti-immigrant attitudes. The "standard" cross-lagged model showed bidirectional effects between empathic concern, perspective taking, and anti-immigrant attitudes. In contrast, the Random-Intercept Cross-Lagged Panel Model showed that only perspective taking directly predicted within-person changes in anti-immigrant attitudes. Empathic concern predicted within-person changes in anti-immigrant attitudes indirectly, via its effects on perspective taking. No effects of anti-immigrant attitudes on within-person changes in empathy were found. The relations between empathic concern, perspective taking, and anti-immigrant attitudes were significant at the between-person level. In addition, the results showed changes in anti-immigrant attitudes and perspective taking and a change in empathic concern in mid- but not late adolescence. The results provide strong evidence for the effects of perspective taking on development of anti-immigrant attitudes in adolescence. They also suggest that the link between empathic concern and adolescents' anti-immigrant attitudes can be explained by indirect, within-person effects and by between-person differences. The findings suggest that programs aimed at reducing anti-immigrant attitudes in adolescence should work more closely with youth perspective taking and empathic concern. (Miklikowska, 2018)

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- Miklikowska, M. (2018). Empathy trumps prejudice: The longitudinal relation between empathy and anti-immigrant attitudes in adolescence. Developmental Psychology, 54(4), 703-717.
- photograph by Joseph Szabo via

Imagining Contact, Reducing Prejudice

Abstract: Recent research has demonstrated that imagining intergroup contact can be sufficient to reduce explicit prejudice directed towards out-groups. In this research, we examined the impact of contact-related mental imagery on implicit prejudice as measured by the implicit association test. We found that, relative to a control condition, young participants who imagined talking to an elderly stranger subsequently showed more positive implicit attitudes towards elderly people in general. 

In a second study, we demonstrated that, relative to a control condition, non-Muslim participants who imagined talking to a Muslim stranger subsequently showed more positive implicit attitudes towards Muslims in general. We discuss the implications of these findings for furthering the application of indirect contact strategies aimed at improving intergroup relations. (Turner & Crisp, 2010)

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- Tunrer, R. N. & Crisp, R. J. (2010). Imagining intergroup contact reduces implicit prejudice. The British Journal of Social Psychology, 49(1), 129-142.
- photograph by Bernard herrman (1977) via

The Family Transmission of Ethnic Prejudice

Generally speaking, research on the intergenerational transmission of ethnic prejudice is rather scarce. According to current socialisation theories, the transmission is a bidirectional process involving both parents and children as active persons influencing the outcomes. Transmission becomes a negotiation process. In the context of values, it was suggested that children do not imitate their parental values but interpret them in innovative ways. During adolescence, asymmetrical constellations of earlier periods are renegotiated and relationships outside the family become more important. Adolescents start considering diverse categories and become quite active in the transmission process (Zagrean et al., 2022).

Studies concerning the transmission of ethnic prejudice have unfortunately focused almost exclusively on childhood, thus leaving the adolescence phase under-investigated (Crocetti et al. 2021). Around the age of seven to eight, children begin to consolidate a preference for their ethnicity and progressively reach an identification with their ethnic ingroup. The research involving parents and pre-school- and school-age children (up to 12 years) showed mixed results. Indeed, some of them found a high degree of similarity between the parents’ and the children’s ethnic prejudice (e.g., Epstein and Komorita 1966; Katz 2003), while others reported only a moderate or low similarity (...). Castelli et al. (2009), in their study involving Italian parents and biological three- to six-year-old children, found that the parents’ explicit and implicit negative attitudes1 towards immigrants predicted those of their children, but only in the case of the mothers.

In their systematic review of research articles (four databases: Ebsco, Scopus, PubMed, Web of Science), a study carried out in 2021, Zagrean et al. (2022) addressed the following research questions:

(a) To what extent is there a vertical (between parents and children) and horizontal (between siblings) transmission of ethnic prejudice within the family?
(b) Is the family transmission of ethnic prejudice unidirectional (from parents to children) or bidirectional (between parents and children)?
(c) Which individual and/or relational variables influence the transmission of ethnic prejudice within the family?
(d) Can adolescents’ intergroup contact experiences affect the family influence on adolescents’ ethnic prejudice?

The findings show a moderate bidirectional transmission of ethnic prejudice between parents and adolescents which was influenced by variables such as the adolescents' age, their birth order, their and their parents' gender, the parents' income and the quality of the family relationship (in terms of warmth, closeness, parenting style). The parents' influence and the adolescents' ethnic prejudice were reduced by the adolescents' positive (and frequent) contacts with peers of different ethnicities.

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- Zagrean, I., Barni, D. Russo, C. & Danioni, F. (2022). The Family Transmission of Ethnic Prejudice: A Systematic Review of Research Articles with Adolescents. Social Sciences, 11(6), link
- photograph by Joseph Szabo (1978) via

Quoting Richard Attenborough

"I very, very, very rarely lose my temper. I do get cross sometimes when encountering something that I feel is improper, that I feel is lacking in justice and equity, and this all sounds very pompous and over the top - but these are the things that really upset me: intolerance, prejudice etc. I suppose in more mundane matters, I'm impatient."

Richard Attenborough

photograph (Young Winston, 1972) via

Prayers to Myself. By Samira Saidi.

"Prayers To Myself is a visual story depicting a gentle and different angle towards religion, especially Islam. Redirecting the focus towards the simple understanding of religion as a connective experience between body and nature. Despite all the negative and charged conversations against Islam and its impacts on the worlds. should this story function as an enabler and reminder of different discussions and understandings. Shifting stigma and prejudice towards Muslims in our society and open up a world with different realities, that allows Muslims to exists as individuals with their own thoughts and ideas rather than an unity supporting extreme measures that we are exposed to on the news."
Samira Saidi

"Samira Saidi is an Afro-European, woman of colour, whose practice has the aim to inspect and shift the sociological structures of race (sic), belonging, and explores the duality of intersectional identities through the body." (via)

photographs by Samira Saidi via and via and via

Quoting Bob Marley

"Prejudice is a chain, it can hold you. If you prejudice, you can't move, you keep prejudice for years. Never get nowhere with that."
Bob Marley

photograph of Bob Marley via

An amalgam of current prejudice and the choices of this particular culture

“Ideally, what should be said to every child, repeatedly, throughout his or her school life is something like this: 'You are in the process of being indoctrinated. We have not yet evolved a system of education that is not a system of indoctrination. We are sorry, but it is the best we can do. What you are being taught here is an amalgam of current prejudice and the choices of this particular culture. The slightest look at history will show how impermanent these must be. You are being taught by people who have been able to accommodate themselves to a regime of thought laid down by their predecessors. It is a self-perpetuating system. 

 

Those of you who are more robust and individual than others will be encouraged to leave and find ways of educating yourself — educating your own judgements. Those that stay must remember, always, and all the time, that they are being moulded and patterned to fit into the narrow and particular needs of this particular society.”

Doris Lessing

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photograph by Joel Meyerowitz via

Human Library

The Human Library was launched in Denmark in 2000 by Ronni Abergel, his brother and two colleagues. Originally, it was an event that was open for eight hours a day for four days. Today, the organisation operates on six continents and hosts activities in more than eighty countries. A book is a person volunteering to represent a stigmatised groups - refugee, deafblind, HIV+, ADHD, PTSD, ... - sharing their stories and experiences, answering questions from readers who want to better understand. A special dialogue room is created in which people can talk who would otherwise never talk to each other, a room in which taboo topics can be discussed and stereotypes are challenged (via).

Some human books...

Deafblind: "I am not angry about my situation. I don't even get angry with cab drivers that refuse to pick me up because of my guide dog. But I think it important to give people a chance to understand what life looks like through my eyes."

Brain damaged: "Being allowed to explain what the world looks like through my eyes helps me feel better understood and I feel my readers benefit from the talk, despite my speech impediment."

REFUGEE
"I left my childhood photos of a life I will never get back and I didn't have the choice to leave behind. I left a beautiful place that I called my home."

WHY WE PUBLISHED 

When there is war and conflict, the peaceful and wealthy countries of the world are called upon to come to the aid of the people fleeing the conflict areas. The latest figures from UNHCR show that almost 60 million people are displaced by war worldwide in 2014. That number has only gone up since. 

STEREOTYPES & PREJUDICES 

The stereotypes about the refugee are many. Most of them not so friendly and building on widespread assumptions that refugees are not really on the run but in fact migrants coming to seek work or social benefits. It is of concern that some believe that they are criminals and ran away because they did something illegal in their home country. As the number of refugees grow it is increasingly important to make available information about the conditions for refugees and the circumstances that they fled from. By publishing the refugee we help safeguard a nuanced voice and ensure that this stigmatized group is given an opportunity to be heard by those willing to ask, listen and learn. (literally via Human Library)

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photographs by Joel Meyerowitz via and via

Quoting W. Eugene Smith

"Let truth be the prejudice."
W. Eugene Smith

photograph via

A rather interesting approach to equality...

"I am free of all prejudice. I hate everyone equally."
W. C. Fields (1880-1946)



photograph via

Quoting Albert Einstein

"What a sad era when it is easier to smash an atom than a prejudice."
Albert Einstein



photograph via

Quoting Sir Peter Ustinov

"Prejudices are the starting point of many accumulating disasters in this world. Beware stale opinions, dead opinions, inherited opinions, thoughtlessly adopted."
Sir Peter Ustinov



photograph via

Looking in from the outside

“When I sit down to have a chat with new people, I still think: ‘Am I going to tell them I’m a Traveller?’ You don’t have to say it, but why should you hide it? They say: ‘Are you Irish?’ I say: ‘I’m an Irish Traveller.’ Some people are quite shocked; they look at me and say: ‘I would never know.’ It is a bit hurtful because I think: ‘But what was there to never know? What has changed in their aspect when I said that? Are they looking down on me now?’ There is still that stigma about Travellers. We work in London, we vote and we are a part of the London community, but it seems like we are always looking in from the outside.”
Mena Mongan



photograph (by Perry Ogden) of Paddy and Liam Doran, Irish Travellers via

The Narrative of Ageing and Health Care Costs

Abstract: This study documents the widespread belief among the public, “pundits,“ and policymakers that health care inflation in the United States is heavily influenced by longevity. It demonstrates the error of that belief. It points out that health care experts recognize that, although health care costs for the elderly are high, the aging of the population is an insignificant factor in health care cost inflation.



Nevertheless, existing literature tends to ignore important influences on cost, such as poverty, lack of access, lifestyle issues, and matters of social justice. It also ignores the differences among numerous subgroups of patients. Ignoring these factors and concentrating on an aging society as a major cause of health care inflation distracts policymakers' attention from the true causes and leads to unjustified calls for benefit reductions in Medicare. As part of this study, the author includes analyses of hospital discharge data that have not been published previously.

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- Kingsley, D. (2015). Aging and Health Care Costs: Narrative Versus Reality: Aging and Health Care Costs. Poverty and Public Policy, 7(1).
- photograph by Jeff Mermelstein via

Professor Rogelio Lasso describes his experience as a part-black college student in Texas in 1969

I lived with a family friend from Panama. Roberto was blond, blue-eyed and had lived in the United States for years, so he spoke English without an accent. Soon after I arrived, Roberto asked me to join him and two of his white friends for dinner. At the restaurant, the waiter asked me where I was from. I answered, "Panama." He politely told me that although the restaurant was not integrated, he could serve me because I was not an American. He explained that the restaurant did not serve "Negroes or Mexicans," but since I was neither, I was "OK." I pointed out that I was part Black and Native American. "But you are a Panamanian," he patiently explained. "You are welcome to eat and drink here..

(cited in Green, 2008:409)

Exceptionalism:  

It has long been understood that when people encounter a person who differs from a previously held stereotype, they tend not to change the stereotype, but to create a new subtype to accommodate the exception. 

(Green, 2008:407) 

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- Green, T. (2008). Discomfort at work: Workplace assimilation demands and the Contact Hypothesis. North Carolina Law Review, 86(2), 379-440.
- photograph via

Intergroup Contact Theory

According to Allport (1954), four conditions are essential to enhance positive effects of intergroup contact: equal status, common goals, intergroup cooperation, and support of authorities.



Equal status
Equal status needs to be perceived by both groups within the situation. Research findings vary and range from a) contact with outgroup members of lower status showing negative effects to b) being insignificant and equal status within the situation being the key factor.

Common goals
An active, goal-oriented effort (as given in athletic teams) means that teams need each member to achieve their goal.

Intergroup cooperation
Intergroup competition is seen as a barrier to enhancing a positive intergroup contact; cooperation should be the way how common goals are reached.

Support of authorities, law, or custom
Explicit social sanction fosters the acceptance of intergroup contact since norms of acceptance are established by authorities.

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- Pettigrew, T. F. Intergroup Contact Theory. Annual Review of Psychology, 49, 65-85.
- photograph by the magnificent Vivian Maier via

Self-Regulation of Prejudiced Responses. Excerpts.

"Experiment 1 examined subjects' reactions to rejecting a lawschool applicant because of his sexual orientation. This was a discrepant response for both low and high prejudiced subjects. However, the response violated low prejudiced, well-internalized standards for low prejudiced subjects only, so that the discrepancy was larger and more personally significant for low than for high prejudiced subjects. The central question was whether low prejudiced subjects experiencing such a discrepancy would manifest evidence of the engagement of self-regulatory mechanisms that, theoretically, should facilitate the subsequent inhibition of discrepant responses. The results provided clear, converging evidence that the discrepancy experience did engage these self-regulatory mechanisms."



"First, the discrepancy experience produced negative self-directed affect among low but not high prejudiced subjects. Theoretically, such guilty feelings should motivate discrepancy reduction (e.g., Rokeach, 1973) and should serve to establishstrong cues for punishment (cf. Gray, 1982). Second, the discrepancy experience heightened low but not high prejudiced subjects' self-focus. This finding is consistent with Pyszczynskiand Greenberg's (1986,1987) contention that ego-relevant discrepancies increase self-focus, which promotes subsequent regulation of behavior. Further examination of the self-thoughts provided a third indicator of the activation of self-regulatory mechanisms: Low prejudiced subjects in the discrepancy-activated condition were uniquely preoccupied with their personal prejudice-related discrepancy experiences. In fact, over half of their self-thoughts were focused on such discrepancies. Finally,the low prejudiced, discrepancy-activated subjects appeared to attend carefully to discrepancy-relevant information. They spent significantly more time reading the essay than their not-activated counterparts, whereas this difference was not significant for the high prejudiced subjects. The low prejudiced, discrepancy-activated subjects also showed superior recall for the portion of the essay concerning why prejudice-related discrepancies arise. Theoretically, the enhanced attention to discrepancy-relevant information and the heightened attention to personal discrepancy experiences should help low prejudiced individuals eventually gain control over their discrepant responses(see Gray, 1982)."

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- Monteith, M. (1993). Self-Regulation of Prejudiced Responses: Implications for Progress in Prejudice-Reduction Efforts. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 65(3), 469-485.
- photograph by Bruce Gilden via

Prejudice. A Tripartite Conception.

Three components of prejudice are often mentioned: ignorance (arriving at a conclusion before considering facts), hostility (derogatory and hostile attitudes), externalisation (directed at others). Akhtar (2007) proposes an expanded definition since "this conventional tripod" is found "a bit wobbly".



Ignorance and ignoring are the centrepiece of prejudice's definition, however, the author argues, what constitutes a fact remains unclear "in these days of post-modern relativism" asking the question whether we should "restrict ourselves to external reality" or if "the facts in the internal, psychic reality matter as well". Limiting oneself to the former, though, does not mean that we are kept from using revisionist strategies and that sociopolitical interests "readily put a spin on available information to create suitable facts".
Hostility is true of most prejudices but they do not necessarily have to be negative and "naïve idealization is as much a manifestation of prejudice as is ignorant devaluation".
Externalisation of badness are projective mechanisms but they can also involve attitudes about oneself, i.e. turning the target of prejudice into the self (Akhtar, 2007).

Then there are the characterologically narcissistic situations of self-glorification in which a fatal denial of one's blemishes, hostility, and exploitativeness is evident. This too constitutes judgment withouth knowing the facts, though the facts here are mostly intrapsychic ones. On a large group level too, self-glorification occurs as a result of "robbing" a hated group of its good qualities and claiming them for oneself. Also involved here is a negation of the problematic aspects of one's own history. (...) One thing becomes clear in the end. Prejudice can be as easily directed at oneself as it is against others. This pertains to beoth its positive and negative forms, and is applicable to both individuals and groups.
This brief epistemological excursion demonstrates that prejudice can (1) occur in the presence of knowledge, (2) involve good feelings, and (3) be direced at oneself. 

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- Akhtar, S. (2007). From Unmentalized Xenophobia to Messianic Sadism: Some Reflections on the Phenomenology of Prejudice. In H. Parens, A. Mahfouz, S. W. Twemlow, & D. E. Scharff (eds.). The future of prejudice. Psychoanalysis and the prevention of prejudice (7-19). Lanham & Plymouth: Jason Aronson.
- photograph by Bruce Gilden (New Orleans Mardi Gras, 1982) via

Prejudice and Self-Perceived vs Psychometric Intelligence

Results of a study carried out in Belgium (n=183, adults from the general community) revealed that the link between ethnic prejudice and intelligence differs depending on whether intelligence is self-assessed (participants were asked to estimate their intelligence on a scale ranging from 0 to 100) or actual, i.e. psychometrically assessed. In fact, being intelligent (which undermines prejudice) vs believing to be intelligent (and probably perceiving the world in terms of superiority and inferiority) had opposite correlations with subtle racism.

Our results revealed opposite relationships: whereas individuals who scored higher (vs. lower) on an intelligence test showed lower levels of racial prejudice, individuals who perceived themselves as being more intelligent compared to others showed higher levels of racial prejudice. (...) The present results indicate that being more intelligent is related with less racial prejudice, but judging that one is more intelligent than others is related with more racial prejudice. (De Keersmaecker et al., 2017)

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- De Keersmaecker, J., Onraet, E., Lepouttre, N. & Roets, A. (2017). The opposite effects of actual and self-perceived intelligence on racial prejudice. Personality and Individual Differences, 112, 136-138.
- photograph by Magnum photographer Erich Lessing (1923-2018) (Cesenatico, 1960) via