Racism and racial categorization.

Social identity theory predicts that perceivers strongly identified with an in-group will maximize the distinction and maintain a clear boundary between their own and other groups by categorizing others' membership accurately. Two experiments tested the prediction that racially prejudiced individuals, who presumably identify highly with their racial in-group, are more motivated to make accurate racial categorizations than nonprejudiced individuals. Results indicated that prejudiced participants not only took longer to categorize race-ambiguous targets (Experiments 1 and 2), but also made more nonverbal vocalizations when presented with them (Experiment 1), suggesting response hesitation. The results support the hypothesis that, compared to nonprejudiced individuals, prejudiced individuals concern themselves with accurate identification of in-group and out-group members and use caution when making racial categorizations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The substance and the shadow.

Discusses the relationship between advancing technology (the substance) and good scientific theory (the shadow) in industrial/organizational psychology. Solutions presented for bridging the gap between social science and social technology include utilization of a teamwork approach to understanding problems of human abilities, motivations, and interpersonal behavior. Avoiding being prematurely "locked into" a concept before all alternatives are considered, and the incorporation of real-world data into controlled experimental settings, are advocated. Other methods include construction of models and theories that can be revised and updated as new data are supplied, and the strengthening of informational links between the 2 disciplines. (74 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Racism: Calling a Spade a Spade.

Research has documented the deleterious effects of racism on the mental health of people of color. However, the practice of psychotherapy sorely underutilizes these important findings, thereby providing less-than-optimum care. Through the presentation of research and personal stories, the author discusses the necessity of naming racism and of identifying its effects. Guidelines are suggested for transforming difficult racial dialogues into healing experiences for clients, and the necessity of taking stands against racism inside and outside of the therapy office is discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

In the shadow of death

Death dogged Vincent's footsteps throughout his life, and formed a core component of his unconscious fantasy system. It cast a lugubrious shadow over all of his undertakings--he found little joy and less love in life. It found its way onto his canvases, both directly--the grinning death's head--and indirectly. It found expression in his portrayals of sowers and reapers, in his representations of trees--especially the highly symbolic treatments of cypresses--in the menacing crows hovering over storm-darkened fields of wheat, and finally in the images of Christ, suffering and dead, held in the embrace of a loving and grieving mother. If death was a bottomless pit that haunted him with its terrors, it was also a siren song that drew him ever closer to his destiny, ever closer to the edge of the pit. The power of that attraction lies in his identification with the dead Vincent whose place he had taken and whose name he bore. It was through that identification, and through the passageway of suffering and death that he would surcease in the arms of a loving and accepting mother whose warm embrace he had sought throughout his odyssey, but in vain. It was to be gained only in and through death. It was only through death that he would find rest from his pain and would gain the heavenly reward of his suffering in eternal love and bliss.     

Two Forms of Racism and Their Related Outcomes: The Bad and the Ugly.

Two experiments investigated the related outcomes of two forms of racism among college students (413 in the first and 374 in the second experiment) enrolled in a program leading to careers in law enforcement such as police officers. The two forms of racism were the overt, traditional type whereby visible minorities are denigrated the basis of innate characteristics, and the subtle type called neoracism, which incorporates egalitarian values and negative beliefs in the blame of visible minorities for undeserved gains and overall social problems. The design of the experiments allowed for a reality check that they pertained to racial issues relevant to training and work in law enforcement. Experiment 1 showed, as hypothesized, that although both forms of racism are linked, only neoracism is associated with covert attitudes (i.e., unfavourable reactions to employment equity), and traditional racism is related to overt discriminatory behavioural intentions. Experiment 2 investigated the impact of priming a negative reaction to a visible minority on the pattern of these links. Under such conditions the observed links strongly suggest that respondents regress to old norms as neoracism is then associated with both covert negative attitudes and overt discriminatory behavioural intentions. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Existence of classical projection and the stress-reducing function of attributive projection: A reply to Sherwood.

By definition, classical projection occurs when people project onto others characteristics that are identical to those they possess but are not aware of possessing. The experiments cited by G. G. Sherwood (see record 1982-03692-001) do not provide evidence for the existence of classical projection because the Ss in those experiments were aware of their possession of the characteristics they were projecting. An examination of the methodology and results of the experiments cited by Sherwood as evidence for the stress-reducing function of attributive projection indicates that the evidence is weak, limited, and unreliable. (23 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A note on projection.

Projection if defined as "unwittingly attributing one's own traits to others" may be either defensive or predictive. It still needs much research effort. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social projection and social comparison of opinions.

Using the notion of "social projection," in which a person self-generates a consensus for his or her own opinion, Festinger's (1954) theory of social comparison processes was reformulated, and predictions derived from the new model were tested. A 2?×?3 factorial design that cross-cut two levels of background similarity of a comparison other (similar, dissimilar) and three levels of comparison information (agree, disagree, no information control) on a legal case was used. The subject, believing that he or she was paired with another subject who either shared (similar) or did not share (dissimilar) a common background, subsequently compared his or her opinion on the case with the other's opinion. Emotional and cognitive reactions were measured using questionnaire and skin resistance. Results supported the predictions: Only disagreement with a similar other produced a negatively toned emotional response as well as decreases in opinion confidence, opinion importance, and readiness to act on the opinion. Positively toned reactions generated by agreement with a dissimilar other are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Racism in out midst: Listening to psychologists of color.

How is racism covertly or overtly active in psychological theory, practice, and policy? The field of psychology has given little attention to addressing this question. Using a qualitative interviewing approach, this study assessed racism in psychology from the unique perspectives of 8 psychologists of color. An analysis of in-depth responses to 3 target questions suggested that although participants believed that the field has made gains, negative appraisals very clearly predominated, and covert acts of racism were cited, providing additional evidence that racism is in psychology's midst. Suggestions for addressing racism within psychology are made. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

An example of assimilative projection.

86 children ranging in age from 5 to 14 were asked "How old do you think Peter Pan was?", after seeing the Walt Disney cartoon film, Peter Pan. For the entire group, the Pearson r for their ages and the guessed age for Peter Pan was .51. "Sharing imaginatively in Peter's adventures, the child presumably feels close to Peter and therefore perceives Peter as resembling himself." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A simplex of paranoid projection.

The study was designed to test the hypothesis that a Guttman simplex could describe the relations among 8 behaviors commonly employed to describe paranoid projection. 2 correlation tables based on 2 independent samples were tested for the presence of a simplex and a close fit was obtained. A comparison of the simplex rank order of the behaviors and a rank order obtained from 10 clinicians showed the 2 orders to be completely consistent. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Living in the shadow of the Freud family.

Reviews the book, Living in the shadow of the Freud family by Sophie Freud (see record 2007-07641-000). This book is fascinating for many reasons, not the least of which is that it is "written and edited" by Sophie Freud, Sigmund Freud's distinguished granddaughter, Professor Emerita of Social Work at Simmons College. The book will be of interest to anyone who wishes to learn more about the life and culture of the creator of psychoanalysis. The author challenges some of the assumptions made by Freud biographers, including the belief that his nursemaid stole pennies from the family, resulting in her firing and imprisonment. This book reveals the importance of writing. The author reminds us that the "psychological literature suggests that we should help old people to remember their childhood", and the book demonstrates the truth of this observation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Auditory-phonetic projection and lexical structure in the recognition of sine-wave words.

Speech remains intelligible despite the elimination of canonical acoustic correlates of phonemes from the spectrum. A portion of this perceptual flexibility can be attributed to modulation sensitivity in the auditory-to-phonetic projection, although signal-independent properties of lexical neighborhoods also affect intelligibility in utterances composed of words. Three tests were conducted to estimate the effects of exposure to natural and sine-wave samples of speech in this kind of perceptual versatility. First, sine-wave versions of the easy and hard word sets were created, modeled on the speech samples of a single talker. The performance difference in recognition of easy and hard words was used to index the perceptual reliance on signal-independent properties of lexical contrasts. Second, several kinds of exposure produced familiarity with an aspect of sine-wave speech: (a) sine-wave sentences modeled on the same talker; (b) sine-wave sentences modeled on a different talker, to create familiarity with a sine-wave carrier; and (c) natural sentences spoken by the same talker, to create familiarity with the idiolect expressed in the sine-wave words. Recognition performance with both easy and hard sine-wave words improved after exposure only to sine-wave sentences modeled on the same talker. Third, a control test showed that signal-independent uncertainty is a plausible cause of differences in recognition of easy and hard sine-wave words. The conditions of beneficial exposure reveal the specificity of attention underlying versatility in speech perception. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

The conscious control of thematic projection.

Conducted 2 experiments with undergraduate Ss (N = 118). In Session 1 of Exp I, one group was instructed to be honest in responding to the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT), while another group was instructed to fake high need for achievement. In Session 2, instructions for the 2 groups were reversed. Results indicate that Ss could successfully fake the possession of need for achievement. In Session 1 of Exp II, all Ss were instructed to respond honestly to the TAT. In Session 2, Ss were instructed either to be honest again or to inhibit projections revealing their personalities. Test-retest reliability was lower for Ss who had faked responses in the 2nd session than for Ss who had been honest. In neither experiment were judges able to identify Ss who were faking. The findings that Ss can consciously introduce false projections and inhibit true projections have implications for the theory of projection (i.e., persons unconsciously project unconscious traits) and for the use of projective techniques for personality assessment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Influence of the stimulus object upon the complimentary and supplementary projection of fear.

2 studies were conducted bearing on the hypothesis that frightened boys attribute malice to male adults but attribute fear to other boys. In the 1st experiment, a Halloween setting was used to elicit fear. The experimental group, in comparison to a matched control group, manifested a reliable increment in attribution of maliciousness to pictures of men and boys but no significant change in attribution of fear. Because of possible complications due to hostility arousal, a 2nd experiment was carried out in which judgments were elicited from boys who thought they were going to participate in a study involving frightening equipment. Under these conditions, the experimental Ss attributed reliably more maliciousness to men and reliably more fear to boys. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceived similarity and the projection of similarity: The influence of valence.

Some of the implications of Heider's concept of balance were investigated using 104 students as Ss. Based upon their responses to the Revised Allport-Vernon Scale of Values, partially completed test booklets were prepared incorporating different degrees of similarity to each Ss' original answers. The Ss were required to complete them in the way the hypothetical person had. The results confirmed the hypotheses. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Racism as a stressor for African Americans: A biopsychosocial model.

Various authors have noted that interethnic group and intraethnic group racism are significant stressors for many African Americans. As such, intergroup and intragroup racism may play a role in the high rates of morbidity and mortality in this population. Yet, although scientific examinations of the effects of stress have proliferated, few researchers have explored the psychological, social, and physiological effects of perceived racism among African Americans. The purpose of this article was to outline a biopsychosocial model for perceived racism as a guide for future research. The first section of this article provides a brief overview of how racism has been conceptualized in the scientific literature. The second section reviews research exploring the existence of intergroup and intragroup racism. A contextual model for systematic studies of the biopsychosocial effects of perceived racism is then presented, along with recommendations for future research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive complexity and assimilative projection in attitude change.

"Students in two undergraduate psychology courses were administered the same attitude scales on two occasions. The second administration was accompanied by information concerning the expressed opinions of either generals or peers. As hypothesized, those students showing little change in their attitude scale scores were found to be high on a measure of cognitive simplicity. Those students who were influenced by peers perceived themselves as more similar to peers than students who were negative to peer influence." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The roles of conflict and internalized demands in projection.

"The prediction was made that (a) the direction of projection is determined by internalized demands, and (b) the strength of projection is directly related to the degree of conflict and ambivalence over a trait. The results have tended to confirm these predictions." 19 references. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)