Group-type distinctions are spontaneously activated cognitive structures, not mere rating tasks

Evidence

One important issue facing virtually all studies identifying different types of groups is the question of whether the typology is in fact “real.” That is, most studies have used ratings or sortings of groups as a basis for analyses of a group typology. The concern is that the typology may be a product of deliberative thought while completing these tasks but may not represent group types that are spontaneously used in group perceptions. Sherman et al. (2002) addressed this question by adapting the “who said what” paradigm (Taylor, Fiske, Etcoff, & Ruderman, 1978). Participants saw a series of photos of male persons, each identified by a group label. The group labels were either intimacy groups (family, friend), task groups (jury member, coworker), or social categories (French, Presbyterian). The photos were then shown again and the participants’ task was to provide the group label for each person. Errors in the participants’ responses could either be within-group-type errors (identifying a “jury member” as a “coworker”) or between-grouptype errors (identifying a “Presbyterian” as a “coworker”). On the basis of chance, the two types of errors should occur with equal frequency. However, within-group-type errors were significantly more frequent. Why would this difference occur? The fact that groups of the same type were confused with each other more often than were groups of different types indicates that participants had spontaneously used these group types in processing and storing the descriptive information in memory. Thus, these group types appear to have a status beyond simple strategies for rating groups on rating scales. Participants have cognitive structures for these group types that they spontaneously use in processing information about groups. — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 221

Categorization

• XREF: Method parallels the associative-memory error patterns familiar from the stereotype and person-perception literature (Taylor et al. who-said-what), connecting to how ingroup/outgroup categorization happens pre-deliberatively.
• QUESTION: If intimacy/task/social-category types are spontaneously used in memory encoding, does social category membership (the type most relevant to prejudice) get encoded by default in ways that erect category boundaries before any target evaluation starts?
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 221