How are Asian Americans Seen and Evaluated? Examining Ethnic Stereotypes and their Cultural Complexity

Human stereotypes are more complicated and subtle than scholars or lay people often think. Based on the EPA (i.e., evaluation, potency and accuracy) theory of stereotypes (Lee, 2011; Lee, B., W. & Luo, 2007; Lee, J., & McCauley, 2013; Lee, McCauley & Jussim, 2013; Lee, V. S., & Ma, 2007), it was hypothesized and found that stereotypes of Asian Americans are derived on the basis of both evaluative considerations (prejudice) and a realistic assessment of group characteristics. This produces a pattern of stereotypic judgments that contains both agreement and disagreement when comparing stereotypes of Asian Americans among different perceiver groups (European Americans, non-Asian Minority-Americans). The results of the present study also highlight complexities that arise when one considers the effect of inter-group contact on stereotyping. Specifically, an increase in the frequency of inter-group contact was associated with a reduction in negative stereotyping, whereas an increase in the quality or closeness of inter-group contact was associated with an increase in negative stereotyping. It is concluded that inter-group stereotyping reflects a complex mixture of psychological processes that are in need of further investigation

Bases of political judgments: the role of stereotypic and non-stereotypic information

Um den Gebrauch von Stereotypen bei Urteilen über politische Kandidaten zu prüfen, wurden drei Studien durchgeführt. Die erste Studie demonstriert den Effekt von physischer Attraktivität auf die Beurteilung eines Kandidaten, wenn keine anderen entscheidungsrelevanten Informationen verfügbar sind. Es zeigt sich, daß diese dann einen substantiellen Einfluß auf die Persönlichkeitseinschätzung hat. Daraus werden sowohl Schlußfolgerungen über persönliche Qualitäten und die politische Ideologie gezogen. Die weiteren Studien prüften den Zusammenhang von Attraktivität, Parteizugehörigkeit und persönlichen Standpunkten des Kandidaten. Hierbei übt die Attraktivität einen geringeren Einfluß aus. Sollten die Beteiligten nur einen Kandidaten einschätzen, verließen sie sich auf seine politische Vergangenheit und seinen Ruf. Bei der Entscheidung zwischen zwei Kandidaten ist dagegen die Parteizugehörigkeit entscheidender. (psz)'Three experiments investigated the role of stereotypic and nonstereotypic criteria in judgments of political candidates. The effects of physical attractiveness, political party and stands on specific issues on both absolute and comparative judgments of political candidats were examined to evaluate three hypotheses about stereotype and attribute use. In the absence of other information, candidates' physical attractiveness (conveyed through photographs) had a substantial influence on subjects' global evaluations of them and inferences of both their personal qualities and their political ideology. When other information about candidates' party membership and stands on specific issues were available, however, the candidate's attractiveness had no affect on the evaluations of them. When subjects were asked to make comparative judgements of two candidates, however, they based their judgments on each candidate's party membership and not their respective voting records. Implications of these results for the precesses that underlie political judgments and decisions are evaluated.' (authors' abstract

The Cognitive and Affective Determinants of Political Judgments

201 p.Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1988.Recent research in political psychology has emphasized the unique role of beliefs and episodic emotions as determinants of attitude toward a political candidate. A conceptual distinction between "beliefs" and "emotions" has been argued on the basis of the finding that evaluative consistency mechanisms appear to be more pronounced in beliefs than in emotions. The unique role of beliefs and emotions as determinants of attitude has been argued on the basis of the finding that beliefs and emotions operate as unique predictors of attitude. The results of this dissertation suggest that these findings only occur when employing a traditional survey approach in which a common set of items is administered to all respondents. When examining beliefs and emotions that are salient for each particular individual respondent: (1) there was no indication that beliefs are more strongly influenced by evaluative consistency mechanisms than are emotions, (2) respondents were quite capable of generating cognitive explanations for their emotional responses, and (3) these cognitive explanations fully accounted for the role of emotions as predictors of attitude. On the basis of these findings, it is concluded that an individual's beliefs are not more strongly influenced by evaluative consistency mechanisms than are an individual's emotions. And more importantly, it is possible to locate a cognitive basis of emotion that fully accounts for the relation between episodic emotions and attitude toward the candidate.U of I OnlyRestricted to the U of I community idenfinitely during batch ingest of legacy ETD

“I Feel Your Pain”: The Effect of Displaying Empathy on Political Candidate Evaluation

Two experiments demonstrate that highly empathetic messages conveyed by a political candidate produce more favorable attitudes and increase the likelihood individuals will vote for the political candidate. Study 1 revealed this Empathetic Communication Effect is stronger among female political candidates than male. Compared to male candidates, female candidates are evaluated more positively when they engage in empathetic language but are more harshly penalized when they fail to display empathy. An analogous pattern emerged for candidate party in Study 2. Namely, the Empathetic Communication Effect is stronger among Democratic political candidates than Republican political candidates. Results also explore the impact of empathetic rhetoric on perceptions of candidates’ socio-emotionality and instrumentality

Implicit Evaluation of Familiar and Novel Concepts Presented at Low Levels of Conscious Detectability

In 2 experiments, implicit evaluation of novel and familiar concepts was assessed using a sequential priming procedure that enabled estimates of evaluative priming effects at low levels of detectability. In Experiment 1, the novel concepts referenced common names, and in Experiment 2 they referenced nonsense words. Whereas familiar concepts yielded priming effects at low levels of detectability in both experiments, novel concepts did not elicit any priming effect. Implicit evaluation of novel concepts has been documented in related research but under conditions that differ from those investigated here. The present results identify important limiting conditions associated with the implicit evaluation effect

Improving police response to persons with mental illness: a multi-level conceptualization of CIT

With the movement of persons with mental illness out of hospitals and into the community, the frequency of contact between police officers and such persons, in crisis or otherwise, has increased significantly. How police respond in these situations has important consequences for the subject, police officers, and the community. Officers (n ϭ 554) from police departments in a major metropolitan area participated in a vignette experiment that examined how information that a subject has a mental illness influences the way police officers respond in several types of situations. Results indicate that officers are less likely to take action based on information provided by victims and witnesses with mental illness. No differences were found in response to suspects with or without a mental illness. The effects of officer characteristics and perceptions of the subject on responses to the vignettes were also examined. Findings suggest several directions for training and future research