scholarly journals The Effects of Minimal Group Membership on Young Preschoolers’ Social Preferences, Estimates of Similarity, and Behavioral Attribution

Collabra ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nadja Richter ◽  
Harriet Over ◽  
Yarrow Dunham
Keyword(s):  
Social Preferences ◽  
Group Membership ◽  
Social Judgments ◽  
Group Boundaries ◽  
Minimal Group ◽  
Group Members ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
Study Participants ◽  
Explicit Measures ◽  
Social Assortment

We investigate young children’s sensitivity to minimal group membership. Previous research has suggested that children do not show sensitivity to minimal cues to group membership until the age of five to six, contributing to claims that this is an important transition in the development of intergroup cognition and behavior. In this study, we investigated whether even younger children are sensitive to minimal cues to group membership. Random assignment to one of either of two color groups created a temporary, visually salient minimal group membership in 3 and 4-year-old study participants. Using explicit measures, we tested whether children preferred minimal group members when making social judgments. We find that, in the absence of any knowledge regarding the two groups, children expressed greater liking for ingroup than outgroup targets. Moreover, children estimated that ingroup members would share their preferences. Our findings demonstrate that from early in development, humans assess unknown others on the basis of minimal cues to social similarity and that the perception of group boundaries potentially underlies social assortment in strangers.

scholarly journals Preference for hierarchy is associated with reduced empathy and increased counter-empathy towards others, especially out-group targets

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sa-kiera Tiarra Jolynn Hudson ◽  
Mina Cikara ◽  
Jim Sidanius
Keyword(s):  
Social Dominance ◽  
Group Membership ◽  
Social Dominance Orientation ◽  
Group Setting ◽  
Group Boundaries ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Prejudicial Attitudes ◽  
Status Differences

The capacity to empathize with others facilitates prosocial behavior. People’s willingness and capacity to empathize, however, is often contingent upon the target’s group membership – people are less empathic towards those they categorize as out-group members. In competitive or threatening intergroup contexts, people may even feel pleasure (counter-empathy) in response to out-group members’ misfortunes. Social dominance orientation (SDO), or the extent to which people prefer and promote group-based inequalities, is an ideological variable that is associated with a competitive view of the world, increased prejudicial attitudes, and decreased empathy. Thus, higher levels of SDO should be associated with reduced empathy and increased counter-empathy in general, but especially towards those whose subjugation maintains group inequalities. Across three studies we show that among White individuals, higher SDO levels are associated with less empathy, and more counter-empathy in response to others’ good and bad fortunes. More importantly, these reductions in empathy and increases in schadenfreude as a function of SDO were significantly stronger for Asian and Black targets than for in-group White targets when group boundaries were made salient prior to the empathy ratings. Finally, in a fourth study we show that this phenomenon is not dependent upon a history of status differences: higher SDO scores were associated with decreased empathy and increased counter-empathy for competitive out-group (relative to in-group) targets in a novel group setting. We discuss implications of these effects for hierarchy maintenance.

scholarly journals Minimal-group membership influences children's responses to novel experience with group members

2012 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mariah G. Schug ◽  
Anna Shusterman ◽  
Hilary Barth ◽  
Andrea L. Patalano
Keyword(s):  
Group Membership ◽  
Minimal Group ◽  
Group Members

scholarly journals Group conquers efficacy: Preschoolers’ imitation under conflict between minimal group membership and behavior efficacy

PLoS ONE ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (9) ◽  
pp. e0223101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuanyuan Li ◽  
Yifan Liao ◽  
Yuang Cheng ◽  
Jie He
Keyword(s):  
Group Membership ◽  
Minimal Group ◽  
And Behavior

scholarly journals Individual Behavior and Group Membership

2007 ◽  
Vol 97 (4) ◽  
pp. 1340-1352 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary Charness ◽  
Luca Rigotti ◽  
Aldo Rustichini
Keyword(s):  
Group Membership ◽  
Individual Behavior ◽  
Minimal Group Paradigm ◽  
Minimal Group ◽  
Strategic Environments ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Minimal Groups

People who are members of a group and identify with it behave differently from people who perceive themselves as isolated individuals. This paper shows that group membership affects preferences over outcomes, and saliency of the group affects the perception of the environment. We manipulate the saliency of group membership by letting a player's own group watch as a passive audience as decisions are made, and/or by making part of the payoff common for members of the group. In contrast to the minimal-group paradigm, minimal groups alone do not affect behavior in our strategic environments. However, salient group membership significantly increases the aggressive stance of the hosts (people who have their group members in the audience), and tends to reduce that of the guests. (JEL D71, Z13)

From whom do we learn group norms? Low-ranking group members are perceived as the best sources

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer E Dannals ◽  
Emily Reit ◽  
Dale T. Miller
Keyword(s):  
Social Norms ◽  
Correlation Study ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Norm Perception ◽  
Lower Ranking ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Groups And Teams ◽  
Or Team ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
To Receive

Social norm perception is ubiquitous in small groups and teams, but how individuals approach this process is not well understood. When individuals wish to perceive descriptive social norms in a group or team, whose ad- vice and behavior do they prefer to rely on? Four lab studies and one Teld survey demonstrate that when in- dividuals seek information about a team’s social norms they prefer to receive advice from lower-ranking indi- viduals (Studies 1–4) and give greater weight to the observed behavior of lower-ranking individuals (Study 5). Results from correlation (Study 3) and moderation (Study 4) approaches suggest this preference stems from the assumption that lower-ranking team members are more attentive to and aware of the descriptive social norms of their team. Alternative mechanisms (e.g., perceived similarity to lower-ranking team members, greater honesty of lower-ranking team members) were also examined, but no support for these was found.

Political Competition, Partisanship and Interpersonal Trust in Electoral Democracies

2016 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-139 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan E. Carlin ◽  
Gregory J. Love
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Social Preferences ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
Interpersonal Trust ◽  
The United States ◽  
Behavioral Experiments ◽  
Minimal Group ◽  
System A ◽  
The Social ◽  
Osama Bin Laden

How does democratic politics inform the interdisciplinary debate on the evolution of human co-operation and the social preferences (for example, trust, altruism and reciprocity) that support it? This article advances a theory of partisan trust discrimination in electoral democracies based on social identity, cognitive heuristics and interparty competition. Evidence from behavioral experiments in eight democracies show ‘trust gaps’ between co- and rival partisans are ubiquitous, and larger than trust gaps based on the social identities that undergird the party system. A natural experiment found that partisan trust gaps in the United States disappeared immediately following the killing of Osama bin Laden. But observational data indicate that partisan trust gaps track with perceptions of party polarization in all eight cases. Finally, the effects of partisanship on trust outstrip minimal group treatments, yet minimal-group effects are on par with the effects of most treatments for ascriptive characteristics in the literature. In sum, these findings suggest political competition dramatically shapes the salience of partisanship in interpersonal trust, the foundation of co-operation.

“Scrub”

2012 ◽  
Vol 642 (1) ◽  
pp. 86-95 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott N. Brooks
Keyword(s):  
Social Dynamics ◽  
Social Worlds ◽  
Site Analysis ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
The Social ◽  
Specific Setting ◽  
Group Members ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
Complete Account

Conducting ethnographic fieldwork in varied spaces, with different actors, enriches our understanding. A researcher may find paradoxes in practices and ideas and ask for clarification, or recognize that social dynamics and behavior are peculiar to group members present in a specific setting. This article highlights the usefulness of intentional variability and flexibility in the field. Researchers should plan to do multi-site analysis (MSA) to look for negative cases and opportunities to challenge commonsense notions. Additionally, this article emphasizes that the relationships built during fieldwork shape the data that are captured. Therefore, researchers need to consider the bases for their relationships, including what the subjects get out of them, and how subjects’ positionality affects what comes to be known. This perspective de-emphasizes false norms of objectivity and renders a more complete account of the social worlds we study.

scholarly journals On the Stability of Social Preferences in Inter-Group Conflict: A Lab-in-the-Field Panel Study

2021 ◽  
pp. 002200272199408
Author(s):  
Robert Böhm ◽  
Jürgen Fleiß ◽  
Robert Rybnicek
Keyword(s):  
Field Study ◽  
Presidential Election ◽  
Social Preferences ◽  
Panel Study ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Group Conflict ◽  
Considerable Heterogeneity ◽  
Specific Preference ◽  
Group Members ◽  
The Stability

Despite the omnipresence of inter-group conflicts, little is known about the heterogeneity and stability of individuals’ social preferences toward in-group and out-group members. To identify the prevalence and stability of social preferences in inter-group conflict, we gather quota-representative, incentivized data from a lab-in-the-field study during the heated 2016 Austrian presidential election. We assess social preferences toward in-group and out-group members one week before, one week after, and three months after the election. We find considerable heterogeneity in individuals’ group-(in)dependent social preferences. Utilizing various econometric strategies, we find largely stable social preferences over the course of conflict. Yet, there is some indication of variation, particularly when the conflict becomes less salient. Variation is larger in social preferences toward in-group members and among specific preference types. We discuss the theoretical implications of our findings and outline potential avenues for future research.

Copy the In-group: Group Membership Trumps Perceived Reliability, Warmth, and Competence in a Social-Learning Task

2021 ◽  
pp. 095679762110322
Author(s):  
Marcel Montrey ◽  
Thomas R. Shultz
Keyword(s):  
Social Learning ◽  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Learning Strategy ◽  
Group Membership ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Learning Task ◽  
Minimal Group Paradigm ◽  
Learning Game ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Cumulative Cultural Evolution

Surprisingly little is known about how social groups influence social learning. Although several studies have shown that people prefer to copy in-group members, these studies have failed to resolve whether group membership genuinely affects who is copied or whether group membership merely correlates with other known factors, such as similarity and familiarity. Using the minimal-group paradigm, we disentangled these effects in an online social-learning game. In a sample of 540 adults, we found a robust in-group-copying bias that (a) was bolstered by a preference for observing in-group members; (b) overrode perceived reliability, warmth, and competence; (c) grew stronger when social information was scarce; and (d) even caused cultural divergence between intermixed groups. These results suggest that people genuinely employ a copy-the-in-group social-learning strategy, which could help explain how inefficient behaviors spread through social learning and how humans maintain the cultural diversity needed for cumulative cultural evolution.

scholarly journals Reducing Implicit Prejudice

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Calvin K Lai ◽  
Kelly M. Hoffman ◽  
Brian A. Nosek
Keyword(s):  
Social Preferences ◽  
Prejudice Reduction ◽  
Conscious Awareness ◽  
Real World Application ◽  
Implicit Prejudice ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Conscious Control ◽  
Open Issues

Implicit prejudice are social preferences that exist outside of conscious awareness or conscious control. We summarize evidence for three mechanisms that influence the expression of implicit prejudice: associative change, contextual change, and change in control over implicit prejudice. We then review the evidence (or lack thereof) for five open issues in implicit prejudice reduction research: 1) what shows effectiveness in real-world application; 2) what doesn’t work for implicit prejudice reduction; 3) what interventions produce long-term changes in implicit prejudice; 4) measurement diversity in implicit prejudice reduction research; and 5) the relationship between implicit prejudice and behavior. Addressing these issues provide an agenda for clarifying the conditions and implications of reducing implicit prejudice.

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