WHAT HAVE SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGISTS CONTRIBUTED TO ATTEMPTS TO REDUCE PREJUDICE?

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WHAT HAVE SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGISTS CONTRIBUTED TO ATTEMPTS TO REDUCE PREJUDICE?

Prejudice can be defined as ' a negative judgement of a group and its individual members'. (Myers 2002) In addition to prejudice, there is stereotyping. Some psychologists say that these two words are interlinked. You cannot explain prejudice without explaining stereotyping and vice versa. A stereotype is 'a belief about the personal attributes pf a group of people, sometimes over generalised, inaccurate, and often resistant to new information.' (Myers 2002) There are many reasons why people from prejudices. One might say that it's down to human nature and Darwinism. Others might say it's because of past unpleasant experiences or just a part of society that will not fade away.

There are three sources of prejudice; social, emotional and cognitive. Social sources of prejudice include religion, conformity and the social identity theory. Religion is deep rooted in prejudice. For example, there is much prejudice in Northern Ireland between the Catholics and Protestants. Conformity is another reason why people are prejudice. People want to be accepted by their peers and if their peers are prejudice against a particular group, they too will follow the beliefs even though they do not agree with it. The social identity theory also helps explain why people form prejudices. It is thought that people form prejudice making people feel inferior thus increasing their own self-esteem. This is also called ingroup bias. We favour our own group (ingroup) and compare them to other outgroups with a favourable bias towards our own group.
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Emotional sources of prejudice include frustration/aggression theory and the realistic group theory. One example of frustration/aggression theory can be seen during the economic downturn in 1882-1930. People were feeling frustrated by the poverty surrounding them and in turn took out their frustrations on those around them. This resulted in an increase of lynching. This is also named the scapegoat theory. When they cannot find an answer to their problems people will find another way to deal with it. Another emotional source of prejudice that is not very common involves a person being attacked by another person of a ...

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