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Implicit Outgroup Favoritism and Intergroup Judgment: The Moderating Role of Stereotypic Context

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Abstract

Implicit outgroup favoritism has been documented in a variety of socially disadvantaged groups, yet little is known about the implications of having such bias. The present research examined whether implicit outgroup favoritism predicts judgments of ingroup versus outgroup members, and whether that relationship depends on stereotypic context. One hundred and ten African-American participants were assigned a Black versus a White work partner for a task that required skills that are stereotypically White (e.g., intellect) versus Black (e.g., athleticism). Participants rated Black partners as less competent than White partners on the stereotypically White task. Furthermore, participants who implicitly favored Whites liked Black partners less than White partners, but only on the stereotypically White task. Implications for system justification theory are discussed.

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Notes

  1. Seventy-eight percent of the participants had a White experimenter. Experimenter race did not affect participants’ IAT scores or their partner ratings, ps > .49, the critical variables in the study.

  2. We report Cohen’s (e.g., 1988) d as the effect size wherever appropriate. By convention, d values of 0.2, 0.5, and 0.8 are interpreted as small, medium, and large effects, respectively.

  3. In hindsight, we suspect that some participants failed to notice the motivation item, which was not visually salient as it was formatted differently (i.e., circle the response) from other items on the page (i.e., write out the response).

  4. We would like to thank an anonymous reviewer for this suggestion.

  5. Neither participant sex nor task order (i.e., whether participants completed the IAT or partner task first) qualified the obtained partner competence and partner liking findings. These variables were therefore dropped from the reported analyses.

  6. When absolute measures are preferable to relative ones, there are numerous options for researchers. Some examples include priming techniques (e.g., Fazio, Jackson, Dunton, & Williams, 1995), the Go/No-Go Association Task (Nosek & Banaji, 2001), and the Simple Association Test (Blanton et al., 2006).

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Acknowledgements

The research was supported by an Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis Office of Professional Development Grant-in-Aid for Research and by an Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis Honors Program Research Fellow to Leslie Ashburn-Nardo. We would like to thank Kate Emswiller, Katya Goldengur, India Johnson, Gina Platten, and Jamarcus Smith for assistance with data collection and participant recruitment; and Alexander Czopp for his insightful comments on a previous draft of this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis, 402 North Blackford Street, LD 124, Indianapolis, IN, 46202-3275, USA

    Leslie Ashburn-Nardo & Nathan J. Johnson

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  1. Leslie Ashburn-Nardo
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  2. Nathan J. Johnson
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Correspondence to Leslie Ashburn-Nardo.

Appendix

Appendix

Partner rating itemsa

Partner competence items

1. My partner is not likely to do well on the Moon Landing Task (R)

2. I believe that my partner is likely to contribute good ideas on the Moon Landing Task

3. I think my partner will be a competent teammate for the Moon Landing Task

4. I do not anticipate strong contributions from my partner on the Moon Landing Task (R)

5. I think my partner’s qualifications make him/her well suited for the Moon Landing Task

Partner liking items

1. I do not expect to enjoy working on the Moon Landing Task with my partner (R)

2. I think I will like my partner

3. I am happy to be working with this person on the Moon Landing Task

4. I think my partner and I are likely to work well together on the Moon Landing Task

5. I would prefer working with a different partner on the Moon Landing Task (R)

  1. a(R) indicates a reverse-scored item

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Ashburn-Nardo, L., Johnson, N.J. Implicit Outgroup Favoritism and Intergroup Judgment: The Moderating Role of Stereotypic Context. Soc Just Res 21, 490–508 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11211-008-0078-8

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