Social categorization and person memory: The pervasiveness of race as an organizing principle

Two studies investigated the pervasiveness of race as a social categorization and whether the organization of information around racial categories is sensitive to contextual factors. Both studies measured accentuation effects (more intra- than inter-race errors) and own-group bias (fewer confusions between own- than other-group members) in person memory, using the paradigm developed by Taylor, Fiske, Etcoff and Ruderman (1978). Experiment 1 studies the generalization of these effects across ethnic group membership (black/white) and topic (categorization-relevant/irrelevant) in a 2 × 2 [× 4] between-subject design, with type of error as a repeated measure. There was a highly significant accentuation effect, which was not affected by either topic or group membership. Experiment 2, using white subjects only, manipulated anticipated future interaction/no interaction, which affected overall accuracy/error rate, but not the strong accentuation effect. Neither study found any support for an own-group bias. Results are discussed in terms of the automaticity of race as a basis for social categorization.

[1]  Sexual orientation as a basis for categorization in recall , 1986 .

[2]  C. Stangor.  Stereotype Accessibility and Information Processing , 1988 .

[3]  S. Bem,et al.  If you are gender schematic, all members of the opposite sex look alike. , 1985 .

[4]  Steven L. Neuberg,et al.  Motivational Influences on Impression Formation: Outcome Dependency, Accuracy-Driven Attention, and Individuating Processes , 1987 .

[5]  Carol T. Miller.  Categorization and Stereotypes about Men and Women , 1986 .

[6]  T. Ostrom,et al.  Person perception in heterogeneous groups. , 1985 .

[7]  Constantine Sedikides,et al.  Goals in social information processing: The case of anticipated interaction. , 1989 .

[8]  Shelley E. Taylor,et al.  Categorical and contextual bases of person memory and stereotyping. , 1978 .

[9]  T. K. Srull,et al.  Memory for information about persons: the effect of encoding operations on subsequent retrieval , 1983 .

[10]  S. Fiske,et al.  Outcome Dependency and Attention to Inconsistent Information , 1984 .

[11]  Charles M. Judd,et al.  Out-group homogeneity: Judgments of variability at the individual and group levels. , 1988 .

[12]  L. Arcuri.  Three patterns of social categorization in attribution memory , 1982 .

[13]  Von O. Leirer,et al.  Cognitive representation of personality impressions: Organizational processes in first impression formation. , 1980 .

[14]  R. C. Gardner,et al.  Content of stereotypes and the inference of similarity between members of stereotyped groups , 1964 .

[15]  H. Tajfel,et al.  Quantitative judgement in social perception. , 1959, British journal of psychology.

[16]  Steven L. Neuberg,et al.  A Continuum of Impression Formation, from Category-Based to Individuating Processes: Influences of Information and Motivation on Attention and Interpretation , 1990 .

[17]  J. Harvey,et al.  Unsolicited interpretation and recall of interpersonal events. , 1980 .

[18]  M. Rothbart,et al.  Perception of Out-Group Homogeneity and Levels of Social Categorization: Memory for the Subordinate Attributes of In-Group and Out-Group Members , 1982 .

[19]  Carol T. Miller.  Categorization and the Physical Attractiveness Stereotype , 1988 .

[20]  Shelley E. Taylor,et al.  Cognitive Bases of Stereotyping , 1982 .

[21]  J. Brigham,et al.  The Role of Experience and Contact in the Recognition of Faces Of Own‐ and Other‐Race Persons , 1985 .

[22]  E. Berscheid,et al.  Outcome dependency: Attention, attribution, and attraction. , 1976 .

[23]  John C. Turner,et al.  Is Limited Information Processing Capacity the Cause of Social Stereotyping , 1990 .

[24]  P. Devine.  Stereotypes and prejudice: Their automatic and controlled components. , 1989 .

[25]  H. Tajfel,et al.  Classification and quantitative judgement. , 1963, British journal of psychology.