TY - JOUR
T1 - Effects of atypical exemplars on racial beliefs
T2 - Enlightened racism or generalized appraisals
AU - Bodenhausen, Galen V.
AU - Schwarz, Norbert
AU - Bless, Herbert
AU - Wänke, Michaela
PY - 1995
Y1 - 1995
N2 - Although African-Americans as a group are economically disadvantaged compared to the white majority group, there are numerous salient counterexamples of black influence. How do media images of highly successful African-Americans affect Whites′ beliefs about the economic or political status of African-Americans as a whole? Three experiments are reported that begin to address this question by surreptitiously activating thoughts about specific exemplars of African-American success and observing the consequences for a measure of perceived discrimination against Blacks. Contrary to the Enlightened Racism perspective, which claims that images of affluent African-Americans are taken by white audiences as evidence of a lack of discriminatory barriers to black success, Experiment 1 revealed that prior activation of a successful, well-liked black exemplar resulted in increased perceptions of discrimination in contemporary society. Experiment 2 replicated this effect and showed further that it is limited to successful exemplars who are well liked; successful exemplars about whom subjects had more neutral attitudes did not produce any changes in perceptions of discrimination. Finally, Experiment 3 showed that the effect of successful, well-liked exemplars vanishes when people first think about the fact that the exemplars are atypical members of the group. These findings are discussed in terms of a generalized appraisal process in which momentarily salient outgroup exemplars influence intergroup attitudes, which in turn affect judgments and beliefs about the group via an attitude heuristic.
AB - Although African-Americans as a group are economically disadvantaged compared to the white majority group, there are numerous salient counterexamples of black influence. How do media images of highly successful African-Americans affect Whites′ beliefs about the economic or political status of African-Americans as a whole? Three experiments are reported that begin to address this question by surreptitiously activating thoughts about specific exemplars of African-American success and observing the consequences for a measure of perceived discrimination against Blacks. Contrary to the Enlightened Racism perspective, which claims that images of affluent African-Americans are taken by white audiences as evidence of a lack of discriminatory barriers to black success, Experiment 1 revealed that prior activation of a successful, well-liked black exemplar resulted in increased perceptions of discrimination in contemporary society. Experiment 2 replicated this effect and showed further that it is limited to successful exemplars who are well liked; successful exemplars about whom subjects had more neutral attitudes did not produce any changes in perceptions of discrimination. Finally, Experiment 3 showed that the effect of successful, well-liked exemplars vanishes when people first think about the fact that the exemplars are atypical members of the group. These findings are discussed in terms of a generalized appraisal process in which momentarily salient outgroup exemplars influence intergroup attitudes, which in turn affect judgments and beliefs about the group via an attitude heuristic.
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U2 - 10.1006/jesp.1995.1003
DO - 10.1006/jesp.1995.1003
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:21844518671
VL - 31
SP - 48
EP - 63
JO - Journal of Experimental Social Psychology
JF - Journal of Experimental Social Psychology
SN - 0022-1031
IS - 1
ER -