Luciano Arcuri

Language Use in Intergroup Contexts: The Linguistic Intergroup Bias

Three experiments examine how the type of language used to describe in-group and out-group behaviors contributes to the transmission and persistence of social stereotypes. Two experiments tested the hypothesis that people encode and communicate desirable in-group and undesirable out-group behaviors more abstractly than undesirable in-group and desirable out-group behaviors. Experiment 1 provided strong support for this hypothesis using a fixed-response scale format controlling for the level of abstractness developed from Semin and Fiedlers (1988a) linguistic category model. Experiment 2 yielded the same results with a free-response format. Experiment 3 demonstrated the important role that abstract versus concrete communication plays in the perpetuation of stereotypes. The implications of these findings and the use of the linguistic category model are discussed for the examination of the self-perpetuating cycle of stereotypes in communication processes.

Automatic Mental Associations Predict Future Choices of Undecided Decision-Makers

Common wisdom holds that choice decisions are based on conscious deliberations of the available information about choice options. On the basis of recent insights about unconscious influences on information processing, we tested whether automatic mental associations of undecided individuals bias future choices in a manner such that these choices reflect the evaluations implied by earlier automatic associations. With the use of a computer-based, speeded categorization task to assess automatic mental associations (i.e., associations that are activated unintentionally, difficult to control, and not necessarily endorsed at a conscious level) and self-report measures to assess consciously endorsed beliefs and choice preferences, automatic associations of undecided participants predicted changes in consciously reported beliefs and future choices over a period of 1 week. Conversely, for decided participants, consciously reported beliefs predicted changes in automatic associations and future choices over the same period. These results indicate that decision-makers sometimes have already made up their mind at an unconscious level, even when they consciously indicate that they are still undecided.

Nomina Sunt Omina: On the Inductive Potential of Nouns and Adjectives in Person Perception

Six studies (N = 491) investigated the inductive potential of nouns versus adjectives in person perception. In the first 5 studies, targets were either described by an adjective (e.g., Mark is homosexual) or by the corresponding noun (e.g., Mark is a homosexual) or by both (Study 3). The authors predicted and found that nouns, more so than adjectives, (a) facilitate descriptor-congruent inferences but inhibit incongruent inferences (Studies 1-3), (b) inhibit alternative classifications (Study 4), and (c) imply essentialism of congruent but not of incongruent preferences (Study 5). This was supported for different group memberships and inclinations (athletics, arts, religion, sexual preference, drinking behavior, etc.), languages (Italian and German), and response formats, suggesting that despite the surface similarity of nouns and adjectives, nouns have a more powerful impact on person perception. Study 6 investigated the inverse relationship, showing that more essentialist beliefs (in terms of a genetic predisposition rather than training) lead speakers to use more nouns and fewer adjectives. Possible extensions of G. R. Semin and K. Fiedlers (1988) linguistic category model and potential applications for language use in intergroup contexts are discussed.

On the automatic evaluation of social exemplars

The present article focuses on the automatic evaluation of exemplars whose category membership has been learned in the past. Studies 1 and 2 confirmed the hypothesis that once an exemplar has been encoded as a member of a given group, at a later encounter the evaluation associated with the group will be unintentionally retrieved from memory, even when no perceptual cue indicates the exemplars category membership. Study 3 extended the results to the domain of in-group/out-group differentiation. In addition. Studies 4 and 5 confirmed the hypothesis that stored evaluations can be retrieved and affect responses even when the semantic information on which the evaluations were originally based is no longer available for retrieval. Finally, Study 6 investigated spontaneous approach-avoidance behavior tendencies. Overall, results demonstrate the pervasive effects of person-based representations, and they are discussed in terms of recent models of person perception and out-group discrimination.

The role of group membership on the modulation of joint action

Two experiments were conducted to assess whether the emergence of shared representations, as indexed by the joint Simon effect, is modulated by perceived group membership. In both experiments, participants were required to perform a Simon task along another person who was perceived as belonging either to the same group or to a different group. In Experiment 1, ingroup–outgroup discrimination was obtained by dividing participants into two groups based on a superficial criterion; in Experiment 2, it was obtained by manipulating the interdependence experienced by the two acting individuals. The mere social categorization of co-acting participants into groups did not modulate the joint Simon effect which was observed even when participants believed to perform the task along with an individual belonging to a different social group (Experiment 1). On the contrary, the effect was modulated by perceived interdependence, with a null effect when participants experienced negative interdependence (Experiment 2). These results suggest that when acting in a social context, by default, individuals may perceive positive interdependence with co-acting individuals, even when cooperation is not explicitly requested.

Emotion Recognition in Ethiopia The Effect of Familiarity with Western Culture on Accuracy of Recognition

Subjects in Western and westernized literate cultures have always recognized facial expression of emotions more accurately than those tested in nonwesternized cultures. Is this difference attributable only to a different degree of familiarity with the experimental conditions or is this also due to different degrees of familiarity with the expression of the emotions? One hundred Ethiopians (fifty males and fifty females) differing in their degree of familiarization with Western culture were tested in a judgment study and asked to recognize posed facial expressions of emotions encoded by Western subjects. The data show that westernized subjects recognize the emotions presented more accurately than the nonwesternized subjects. In particular, varying degrees of familiarization with Western culture seem to influence recognition accuracy when a specific display rule is associated with the emotion presented.

Selective Exposure in Decided and Undecided Individuals : Differential Relations to Automatic Associations and Conscious Beliefs

People often show a preference for information that confirms their attitudes and beliefs, and this tendency is reduced for opinions that are not held with conviction. The present study shows that both decided and undecided individuals show a tendency to selectively expose themselves to confirmatory information, albeit with different antecedents and consequences. Whereas selective exposure in decided participants was predicted by conscious beliefs and not by automatic associations, selective exposure in undecided participants was predicted by automatic associations and not by conscious beliefs. Moreover, selective exposure led undecided participants to adopt conscious beliefs that were in line with their preexisting automatic associations. Conversely, for decided participants, selective exposure shifted automatic associations in a direction that was in line with their preexisting conscious beliefs. Implications for decision making and mutual influences of automatic associations and conscious beliefs in attitude change are discussed.

Cognitive and linguistic factors in the development of word definitions.

Three studies were carried out in order to account for development of word definitions. Study i was aimed at analysing the role of class inclusion skills and age (5– and 7–year-olds and adults) in production of definitions containing superordinate categorical terms. No differences were found between 7-year-olds who had passed a class inclusion task and those who had not passed it as regards number of definitions containing superordinates, while differences were found between younger and older children and between children and adults. Study 2 was aimed at obtaining some normative criteria on the ‘goodness’ of definitions provided in Study 1, by using adult judges. It was found that the best definitions are those which contain both categorical terms and specific information about the to-be-defined object. It was also found that adults may adjust their standard definitional criteria to the kind of interlocutor (i.e. a child or a Martian). Study 3 confirms that younger childrens definitions fall far short of the adult informativeness and completeness criteria while, by the age of ten, such criteria are met. Overall results were interpreted as conforming to a progressive conventionalization of childrens strategies for defining objects.

The Impact of Loyalty and Equality on Implicit Ingroup Favoritism

Extending recent investigations into the malleability of implicit ingroup favoritism, three experiments examined the role of indirect activation of equality and loyalty. Results showed that priming equality decreased implicit favoritism, measured through the Implicit Association Test and Go/No-Go Association Task, whereas priming loyalty enhanced it; spontaneous behavior (seating distance) was similarly influenced. A boundary condition was observed, namely change of intergroup setting: the effects of priming equality and loyalty ceased when these were primed after an irrelevant ingroup identity was made salient. In general, implicit favoritism can be reduced or increased after the activation of equality and loyalty respectively, and this underlines the importance of tackling discrimination by both lessening its expression, and removing factors that exacerbate it.

Projection Processes in the Perception of Political Leaders

The perception of similarity between voters and politicians deeply affects political judgments. In the present work we investigated how voters may selectively attempt to increase their perceived similarity with liked political leaders by means of projection processes. In two studies, participants had to guess the month of birth of several politicians. The attribution of the personal month of birth was assessed. Data provided evidence of both positive and negative projection processes: As compared to what was expected on the basis of random attributions, ones own month of birth was more likely attributed to politicians of the ingroup but denied to politicians belonging to the disliked coalition. Overall, findings demonstrate that participants modulate their perceived distance with political leaders through selective projection processes, using the self as a judgmental anchor.