Differential Social Perception and Attribution of Intergroup Violence: Testing the Lower Limits of Stereotyping of Blacks
Author(s)
Duncan, B. L.
Abstract
In a modified 4 x4 factorial design with race (Black-White) of the harm-doer and race (Black-White) of the victim as the major factors, the phenomenon of differential social perception of intergroup violence was established. The study used a modification of Interaction Process Analysis in which White undergraduates, observing a videotape of purported ongoing interaction occurring in another room, labeled an act (ambiguous shove) as more violent when it was performed by a Black than when the same act was perpetrated by a White, indicating that the concept of violence was more accessible when viewing a Black, as compared to a White, committing the same act. Causal attributions were also divergent. Situation attributions were preferred when the harm-doer was White, and person (dispositional) attributions were preferred in the Black-protagonist conditions. Results are discussed in terms of perceptual threshold, stereotypy, and attributional biases.
