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Three experiments investigated the phenomenon of war contagion in the context of international relations, hypothesizing that past inter- (but not intra-) state war will facilitate future, unrelated interstate war. Americans showed stronger support for violent responses to new, unrelated interstate tensions after being reminded of an historical war between the U.S. and another state, as compared to an historical domestic war within the U.S. (Study 1). This war contagion effect was mediated by heightened perceived threat from, and negative images of, a fictitious country unrelated to the past war, indicating a generalized effect of past interstate war on perceived threat/images from any foreign country. The war contagion effect was further moderated by national glorification (Study 2). Largely replicating these effects with an additional baseline condition, Study 3 yielded further support for the generalized effect of past interstate war on perceived threat and images, this time with a real third-party country.

This dissertation examined interracial contact and racial prejudice among white, black, Asian, and Latino college students at 28 elite colleges and universities in the United States. The study used longitudinal analyses to identify how interracial contact among college students influenced students' racial prejudice. White students interacted almost exclusively with each other and with Asian students. Asian students interacted with each other and with white students. Latino students were the most integrated, they interacted with all other student groups at high rates. Black students were the most segregated in their interactions as students of other races had less interactions with them on campus. Cross-race interactions during college did not influence white students' exiting levels of traditional and modern racial prejudice. Cross-race interactions during college had limited influence on black and Asian students' exiting levels of racial prejudice, mostly for traditional forms of racial prejudice. Latino students exhibited the most interracial contact effects on their exiting levels of racial prejudice of all student groups with all traditional and modern forms of racial prejudice influenced by cross-race interactions. The consideration of race as a form of social identity was the most powerful influence on students' exiting levels of racial prejudice for all groups. The context of interracial contact at elite colleges and universities and the existence of racialized stages of interaction are discussed in the final chapter to understand the study findings. Lastly, a discussion of the potential implications of this study's results for future intergroup contact research is also presented. / Ph. D.

Humans tend to view those with similar characteristics to their own more favorably than those with dissimilar characteristics. Mahajan and Wynn (2012) suggest this phenomenon is rooted in an innate preference for similarity to self and is enhanced by the salience of the similar characteristic(s). This conclusion was based on results from a study conducted by Mahajan and Wynn showing that infants who chose a food prior to choosing a puppet (High Salience condition) preferred the puppet with the same food preference, whereas infants who chose a food after choosing a puppet (Low Salience condition) showed no preference based on a single measure of choice. However, their results may have been affected by factors other than infant preference such as parental bias or side bias. The purpose of the present study was to replicate Mahajan and Wynn's (2012) Low Salience condition and extend it by assigning 20 infants and their parents (10 infants/parent dyads per group) to either (a) a between group manipulation in which infants' food preference was made "salient" to parents (but not infants) in only one group, or (b) a within-subject repeated measures of infants' choices. Results suggested that the manipulation may have been insufficient to assess parental bias; however, more infants (75%) chose a puppet presented on one side more often than a particular puppet (e.g., similar or dissimilar) suggesting infants' choices may be more a product of side bias than puppet preference.

Seventy-four women with either rheumatoid arthritis (RA). chronic pain syndrome or depression and 59 of their spouse reported on their family cohesion, adaptability, and conflict. From a review of the literature. these three-dimension of family functioning were identified as important in “psychosomatic" families in which an adult member is physiologically vulnerable (Flor & Turk, 1985). Data analysis consisted of cross tabular procedure and MANOVAs. Differences between the groups in terms of health status were explored using a MANOVA with group membership as the independent variable and the Arthritis Impact Measurement Scale (AIMS) as dependent variables. Overall the depression and chronic pain groups; were more similar than the PA group with the exception of the levels of Physical Activity and Pain. For these two dimensions, the RA and chronic pain group were similar while the depression group score indicated better health state. Crosstabular procedures were performed on the FACES III score on cohesion and adaptability both separately and then combined on the Circumplex Model. Higher than expected percentage of disengaged scores were reported by the women in the RA and chronic pain groups and this trend was more pronounced in the spouses' scores of all three groups. The women in all three groups reported fairly normal levels of adaptability as did the spouses of the depression group members, but the spouses of those women with RA and chronic pain reported higher than expected levels of rigidity. Results of MANOVAs to examine differences between the three groups in terms of the family characteristics were significant. The women in the depression group and their spouses reported higher levels of conflict than the members of the RA group. / Ph. D.

<p dir="ltr">Although diversity initiatives can signal identity safety for individuals with stigmatized identities, they often elicit threat responses from dominant group members. How do individuals possessing both a dominant and a non-dominant identity perceive diversity initiatives targeting a stigmatized outgroup? Drawing from literature on the identity safety cue transfer effect and social identity theory, this research examined White women’s responses to organizational diversity initiatives targeting Black Americans. White women indicated less interest and anticipated less inclusion in an organization with an initiative for Black Americans (Studies 1a and 1b). They also expressed less interest and inclusion when reading an initiative that exerted strong outgroup benefit, but not when reading an initiative that exerted a weak outgroup benefit (Study 2). The negative effects of strong outgroup benefit condition was larger among participants who endorsed high zero-sum beliefs. These findings suggest that people may only experience identity safety when an initiative implies potential downstream benefits to their own group. It also highlights the need to consider the complex interplay of social identities in response to diversity initiatives.</p>

The objective of this thesis was to examine the effectiveness of contact and imagined contact (a derivative of direct contact) in reducing intergroup prejudice when the prejudice in question is deemed socially acceptable. Studies focused on two populations that are targets of socially acceptable, prejudice – people suffering from schizophrenia in the U.K., and homosexual men in Jamaica. These target groups were selected because they are similar in that they are both targets of socially acceptable prejudice, but also because of their differences in that the stereotypes associated with them are quite dissimilar. The first part of the thesis empirically tested the assumption that the aforementioned populations are targets of socially acceptable prejudice. Two cross-sectional studies, one of which was also cross-cultural, measured motivation to control prejudice against these target groups, and compared it to motivation to control prejudice against targets of socially unacceptable prejudice. I found that motivation to control prejudice against people with schizophrenia in the U.K. was lower than motivation to control prejudice against Black people in the U.K. Also, motivation to control prejudice against homosexual men was higher in the U.K. and the U.S.A. than in Jamaica, and differences in motivation to control unspecified prejudice were significantly smaller. The second part examined the association between actual contact and prejudice for both populations. Two cross-sectional studies, one of which was also cross-cultural, found that contact was associated with less prejudice. This effect was mediated by intergroup anxiety in all cases, and also by fear in the case of people with schizophrenia. Furthermore, I found that contact was more strongly negatively associated with anti-homosexual prejudice in Jamaica, where the prejudice is socially acceptable, than it was in Britain, where the prejudice is not socially acceptable. The third part tested the effect of imagined contact, a form of extended contact, on prejudice against people with schizophrenia. Four experimental studies demonstrated that imagined contact can be an effective means of reducing prejudice against this group. However imagined contact must be conducted in very specific ways, otherwise it has the potential to increase prejudice against people with schizophrenia.

This thesis aims to investigate the secondary transfer effect of contact, a phenomenon whereby contact with one outgroup leads to improved attitudes towards other, non-contacted outgroups. While evidence mounts for the existence of secondary transfer effects, its underlying mediation processes remain poorly conceptualised and thus, poorly understood. Thus, in this thesis, I aimed to clarify the conditions under and the processes by which the secondary transfer effect works. Chapter 1 introduces intergroup contact theory and traces its development from the contact hypothesis (Allport, 1954) to the uncovering of the secondary transfer effect. Based on theory from all aspects of intergroup contact research, Chapter 1 proposes a theoretically reformulated approach to understanding the deprovincialization hypothesis by way of (1) diversity beliefs, (2) the development of a multicultural outlook on intergroup relations, and (3) a more nuanced understanding of when ingroup identity is likely to relate ethnocentrically to outgroup attitudes. Point three more specifically looks at the role of social dominance orientation as a moderator of the relationship between ingroup identification and outgroup attitude. Chapter 1 also provides an extension to the attitude generalization hypothesis by considering the role that similarity gradients play. Chapter 2 discusses methodological considerations important to the analysis strategy used throughout the thesis. Six empirical investigations across three contexts—England (Studies 1 and 2), Northern Ireland (Studies 3 and 4) and South Africa (Studies 5 and 6) set out to test the secondary transfer effect and the hypotheses offered in Chapter 1. Across three cross-sectional studies (Studies 1, 2, 3, and 4), a three-wave longitudinal study (Study 5) and an experimental study (Study 6), I was able to show the following: (a) that attitude generalization is a robust mediator of the secondary transfer effect (Studies 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5); (b) similarity gradients qualify the attitude generalization process such that attitudes generalize more strongly between outgroups that are perceived to be similar (Studies 3, 4, and 5); (c) that diversity beliefs (Study 2) and multiculturalism (Study 4), as alternative interpretations of the deprovincialization effect, mediate the secondary transfer effect; (d) social dominance orientation moderates the relationship between ingroup identification and outgroup attitude (Study 3); (e) that the deprovincialization and attitude generalization hypotheses are not independent, but rather interrelated processes of the secondary transfer effect (Studies 2, 3, and 4); (f) that experimentally manipulated forms of extended contact can lead to the secondary transfer effect because group categories and membership are made salient during the extended contact experience (Study 6); and (g) that it is contact that leads to wider attitude generalization rather than less prejudiced people seeking contact from a wider pool of social groups (Study 5). Furthermore, owing to their three-wave longitudinal (Study 5) and experimental (Study 6) designs, these two studies provide the most convincing evidence of the causal nature—from contact to reduced prejudice—of the secondary transfer effect to date. Taken together, these six studies provide a wealth of critical support for the secondary transfer effect as well as for the reformulated deprovincialization and the extended attitude generalization hypotheses.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-07-27T14:21:33Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Thalita Vargas Leite Martignoni.pdf: 660624 bytes, checksum: c7865de95be6d793dfa04ba9ab6a0506 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008-03-31 / A longitudinal study is reported which examines the consequences of intergroup contact, collective guilt and group-based responsibility over the ingroup&#146;s past misdeeds for the endorsement of reparation attitudes towards the outgroup. Respondents were non- indigenous brazilian high school students (N=1.145/823; time lag = 1 month) and the target groups were brazilian indigenous people. Data were collected in two groups of cities where there was or there was not frequent contact with indigenous people. It was hypothesised and confirmed that group-based responsibility predicted reparation attitudes longitudinally, and this relationship was partially mediated by collective guilt. Intergroup contact was supposed to have negative influence on reparation attitudes, which was confirmed, and this relationship should be mediated by collective guilt, which was not confirmed. These results are analysed and discussed according to the Intergroup Contact Theory and intergroup emotion studies, taking into account brazilian indigenous and non-indigenous intergroup relations. / Este estudo longitudinal examina as conseqüências do contato intergrupal, culpa coletiva e responsabilidade grupal do endogrupo nas atitudes de apoio à reparação ao exogrupo. Os participantes foram alunos não-indígenas de ensino médio (n=1.145/823; intervalo = 1 mês) e os indígenas foram o grupo-alvo. Os dados foram coletados em dois grupos de cidades onde havia ou não contato freqüente com indígenas. Foi hipotetizado e confirmado que a responsabilidade grupal prediz atitudes de reparação longitudinalmente, e esta relação foi parcialmente mediada pela culpa coletiva. Foi previsto que o contato intergrupal teria influência negativa nas atitudes de reparação, o que se confirmou, e esta relação deveria ter sido mediada pela culpa coletiva, mas esta hipótese não foi confirmada. Os resultados são analisados e discutidos à luz da Teoria do Contato Intergrupal e de estudos de sentimentos intergrupais, considerando-se as relações intergrupais entre indígenas e não-indígenas no contexto brasileiro.