The social approach Prejudice Social Approach

Consider when you look at each of the following pictures: A – How might people feel about these individuals? B – How might people behave towards these individuals? C – What might people think about these individuals?

Person with a disability

Blondes

Older adult

Lesbian couple

Punk

Public school girls

Homosexual couple

Graffiti artist

Goth

Muslim women

Orthodox Jew

Rastafarian

Psychologists try to explain how people’s feelings, thoughts and actions in relation to members of different groups arise.

Attitudes are made up of three components: A – Affective component – how you feel B – Behavioural component – what you do C – Cognitive component – what you think

Labelling, Stereotyping, and judging leads to…..

Prejudice and Discrimination

Sexism

‘Pre’ (meaning before) and ‘judice’ (meaning justice) To make judgements about someone based on their membership of a group rather than their individual nature. Prejudice

Treating people differently according to their group membership. Discrimination Treating people differently according to their group membership.

Social identity Theory (Tajfel 1970) According to Tajfel’s SIT you just need ‘groups’ for prejudice to arise, not necessarily as a result of conflict over resources (which is what Sherif’s Realistic Conflict theory of prejudice claims) According to SIT, a persons self image has two components a personal identity a social identity which is formed by identification with the social groups you belong to e.g. gender, age, football team, etc

Prejudice consists of three elements Affective element Behavioural element Cognitive element

Affective element This involves the feelings experienced in response to the group. If we are prejudiced against a group we may experience feelings of anger, fear, hate, or disgust when we encounter a member of that group.

Behavioural element This consists of our actions towards the object of the prejudice. Behaving differently towards people based on their membership of a group is called discrimination. Our actions against members of a group, against which we hold a prejudice, can range from avoidance and verbal criticism to mass extermination.

Cognitive element This involves the beliefs held about a group. These beliefs will be in the form of stereotypes, common but over simple views of what a particular group of people are like.

There are 3 processes involved in determining our social identity STOP There are 3 processes involved in determining our social identity Social Categorisation – which leads to ‘in’ and ‘out’ groups. Social Identification – we identify ourselves with people who are like us! Social comparison – which leads to ‘in’ group favouritism and ‘out’ group negative bias. Isn't this CIC ?!!