Jazmin L. Brown-Iannuzzi

Sequential Priming Measures of Implicit Social Cognition A Meta-Analysis of Associations With Behavior and Explicit Attitudes

In a comprehensive meta-analysis of 167 studies, the authors found that sequential priming tasks were significantly associated with behavioral measures (r = .28) and with explicit attitude measures (r = .20). Priming tasks continued to predict behavior after controlling for the effects of explicit attitudes. These results generalized across a variety of study domains and methodological variations. Within-study moderator analyses revealed that priming tasks have good specificity, only predicting behavior and explicit measures under theoretically expected conditions. Together, these results indicate that sequential priming—one of the earliest methods of investigating implicit social cognition—continues to be a valid tool for the psychological scientist.

Subjective Status Shapes Political Preferences

Economic inequality in America is at historically high levels. Although most Americans indicate that they would prefer greater equality, redistributive policies aimed at reducing inequality are frequently unpopular. Traditional accounts posit that attitudes toward redistribution are driven by economic self-interest or ideological principles. From a social psychological perspective, however, we expected that subjective comparisons with other people may be a more relevant basis for self-interest than is material wealth. We hypothesized that participants would support redistribution more when they felt low than when they felt high in subjective status, even when actual resources and self-interest were held constant. Moreover, we predicted that people would legitimize these shifts in policy attitudes by appealing selectively to ideological principles concerning fairness. In four studies, we found correlational (Study 1) and experimental (Studies 2–4) evidence that subjective status motivates shifts in support for redistributive policies along with the ideological principles that justify them.

Intention Invention and the Affect Misattribution Procedure Reply to Bar-Anan and Nosek (2012)

A recent study of the affect misattribution procedure (AMP) found that participants who retrospectively reported that they intentionally rated the primes showed larger effect sizes and higher reliability. The study concluded that the AMP’s validity depends on intentionally rating the primes. We evaluated this conclusion in three experiments. First, larger effect sizes and higher reliability were associated with (incoherent) retrospective reports of both (a) intentionally rating the primes and (b) being unintentionally influenced by the primes. A second experiment manipulated intentions to rate the primes versus targets and found that this manipulation produced systematically different effects. Experiment 3 found that giving participants an option to “pass” when they felt they were influenced by primes did not reduce priming. Experimental manipulations, rather than retrospective self-reports, suggested that participants make post hoc confabulations to explain their responses. There was no evidence that validity in the AMP depends on intentionally rating primes.

Discrimination hurts, but mindfulness may help: Trait mindfulness moderates the relationship between perceived discrimination and depressive symptoms

Discriminatory experiences are not only momentarily distressing, but can also increase risk for lasting physical and psychological problems. Specifically, significantly higher rates of depression and depressive symptoms are reported among people who are frequently the target of prejudice. Given the gravity of this problem, this research focuses on an individual difference, trait mindfulness, as a protective factor in the association between discrimination and depressive symptoms. In a community sample of 605 individuals, trait mindfulness dampens the relationship between perceived discrimination and depressive symptoms. Additionally, mindfulness provides benefits above and beyond those of positive emotions. Trait mindfulness may thus operate as a protective individual difference for targets of discrimination.

The Relationship Between Mental Representations of Welfare Recipients and Attitudes Toward Welfare

Scholars have argued that opposition to welfare is, in part, driven by stereotypes of African Americans. This argument assumes that when individuals think about welfare, they spontaneously think about Black recipients. We investigated people’s mental representations of welfare recipients. In Studies 1 and 2, we used a perceptual task to visually estimate participants’ mental representations of welfare recipients. Compared with the average non-welfare-recipient image, the average welfare-recipient image was perceived (by a separate sample) as more African American and more representative of stereotypes associated with welfare recipients and African Americans. In Study 3, participants were asked to determine whether they supported giving welfare benefits to the people pictured in the average welfare-recipient and non-welfare-recipient images generated in Study 2. Participants were less supportive of giving welfare benefits to the person shown in the welfare-recipient image than to the person shown in the non-welfare-recipient image. The results suggest that mental images of welfare recipients may bias attitudes toward welfare policies.

Economic inequality increases risk taking

Significance Income inequality is rising around the world. Increased income inequality has been linked with higher rates of crime, greater debt, and poorer health, but the mechanisms linking inequality to poor outcomes among individuals are poorly understood. This research tested a behavioral account linking inequality to individual decision making. The account suggests that more unequal outcomes lead people to perceive that they need more resources to be satisfied. Higher perceived needs, in turn, motivate greater risk taking to meet those needs. Results of three experiments and an analysis of large-scale internet search data supported the proposed account. Results suggest that inequality may promote a range of poor outcomes, in part, by increasing risky behavior. Rising income inequality is a global trend. Increased income inequality has been associated with higher rates of crime, greater consumer debt, and poorer health outcomes. The mechanisms linking inequality to poor outcomes among individuals are poorly understood. This research tested a behavioral account linking inequality to individual decision making. In three experiments (n = 811), we found that higher inequality in the outcomes of an economic game led participants to take greater risks to try to achieve higher outcomes. This effect of unequal distributions on risk taking was driven by upward social comparisons. Next, we estimated economic risk taking in daily life using large-scale data from internet searches. Risk taking was higher in states with greater income inequality, an effect driven by inequality at the upper end of the income distribution. Results suggest that inequality may promote poor outcomes, in part, by increasing risky behavior.

The invisible man: Interpersonal goals moderate inattentional blindness to african americans

Research on inattentional blindness demonstrates that when attending to 1 set of stimuli, people often fail to consciously perceive a task-irrelevant object. In this experiment, we tested for selective inattentional blindness to racial outgroup members. We reasoned that some racial groups would be perceived as more relevant than others, depending on the interpersonal goal that was active. White participants were primed with interpersonal goals that ranged from psychologically distant (searching for a coworker) to psychologically close (searching for a romantic partner). In the control condition, no goal was explicitly activated. Then, participants watched a video of 2 teams passing a ball and were asked to count the ball passes of one of the teams. In the middle of the video, a Caucasian or an African American man walked through the scene. Participants were then asked to report whether they had seen the interloper. Results revealed that as interpersonal goals became closer to the self, participants were less likely to see the African American man. This research demonstrates a new form of social exclusion based on early attention processes that may perpetuate racial bias.

Objective and subjective socioeconomic status and health symptoms in patients following hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.

Recent research indicates that subjective socioeconomic status (SES) – the perception of ones own SES compared with other people – is an important predictor of cancer‐related health outcomes. Subjective SES may function as a psychosocial mechanism by which objective SES affects health, well‐being, and, more broadly, quality of life among cancer survivors. This study tested whether the association between objective SES and indicators of quality of life was mediated by subjective SES in a sample of cancer survivors who had undergone hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.

Narrow imaginations: How imagining ideal employees can increase racial bias

When people make important decisions, such as selecting a job candidate or graduate school applicant based on how well they fit with that imagined ideal. In two experiments we provide evidence that imagining the ideal has unintended consequences. Imagining an ideal candidate for a professional job led participants to preferentially imagine a White candidate (Experiment 1) and to preferentially hire a White candidate over a Black candidate with matched qualifications (Experiment 2). These effects were independent of explicit prejudice, suggesting that even low-prejudice individuals may be affected by this bias. However, an alternative imagery strategy—imagining a variety of suitable applicants—was effective at remediating the bias. In some cases discrimination may result not from prejudiced attitudes but from failures of the imagination.

Black Groups Accentuate Hypodescent by Activating Threats to the Racial Hierarchy

One reason White people categorize Black–White Biracial people as Black (called hypodescent) is to maintain the existing racial hierarchy. By creating a strict definition of who can be White, the selectivity, and thus status, of White people increases. Given that racial hierarchies are about the relative status of groups, we test whether perceiving Black groups increases hypodescent by activating fears about shifts in the racial hierarchy (i.e., a majority/minority shift). Indeed, White people rated (Study 1) and stereotyped (Study 4) Black–White Biracial people as more Black in Black groups (but not White groups; Study 2) than when alone. Critically, this pattern was driven by White people relatively high in fear of a majority/minority shift (Study 3a) or those experimentally led to feel this threat (Study 3b). We conclude that Black groups increase hypodescent by activating fears about shifts in the racial hierarchy, posing consequences for racial stereotyping.