A single dissenting voice can shift private attitudes about racism

Evidence

If a single expression of prejudice can reinforce prejudice, can confronting individuals who make prejudicial statements or who behave in prejudicial ways diminish it? There are naturally costs to such confronting, because doing so breaks the established social norm of generally accepting the behavior of others. But even a single dissenter can be effective at promoting changes in prejudiced norms. Blanchard, Crandall, Brigham, and Vaughn (1994) arranged for White students to hear another student either condone or condemn racism before answering five questions about how their college should respond to acts of racism. Hearing another student condemn racism increased participants’ expressed antiracist opinions, and hearing someone condone racism reduced antiracist expressions, compared to a control condition in which no information about others’ opinions was provided. In addition, these changes occurred not only in participants’ oral responses in the presence of the person making the comment, but also on their privately expressed attitudes. This suggests that the attitude change was not simply based on public conformity, but reflected a real change in private attitudes. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 1922

If a single expression of prejudice can reinforce prejudice, can confronting individuals who make prejudicial statements or who behave in prejudicial ways diminish it? There are naturally costs to such confronting, because doing so breaks the established social norm of generally accepting the behavior of others. But even a single dissenter can be effective at promoting changes in prejudiced norms. Blanchard, Crandall, Brigham, and Vaughn (1994) arranged for White students to hear another student either condone or condemn racism before answering five questions about how their college should respond to acts of racism. Hearing another student condemn racism increased participants’ expressed antiracist opinions, and hearing someone condone racism reduced antiracist expressions, compared to a control condition in which no information about others’ opinions was provided. In addition, these changes occurred not only in participants’ oral responses in the presence of the person making the comment, but also on their privately expressed attitudes. This suggests that the attitude change was not simply based on public conformity, but reflected a real change in private attitudes. — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice, 1922

Categorization

• XREF: Parallels the law-merchant literature on how a single informative signal can reshape norms in a community. — connects to: A diversity of listeners enables speakers to voice public-spirited ideas they otherwise suppress — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics: how Americans…, 1472
• SEED: Angle for an essay: the ‘one dissenter’ effect as an overlooked lever in everyday moral courage — why individual confrontation works on private attitudes, not just public compliance.
• corroborated: 4 independent passages support this claim — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 1922; John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice: Fifty Years…, 1922