Ingroup favoritism stems from projecting self onto ingroup, not from self-enhancement striving

Evidence

People define their ingroups by a process of self-anchoring, viewing the group as similar to the self. Consequently, self-evaluations predict ingroup evaluations, especially for people have a strong need for cognitive structure (Otten & Bar-Tal, 2002). This kind of self-anchoring plausibly underlies ingroup favoritism. Self-ratings predict ingroup favoritism better than does the positivity of the trait, suggesting that generalization from self to ingroup (i.e., self-anchoring), rather than a striving for positive ingroup distinctiveness, might underlie ingroup favoritism (Otten & Wentura, 2001). — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 340

Allport’s ideas about social categorization and recategorization at higher levels of inclusiveness foreshadowed many of the theoretical and empirical developments of importance to contemporary thinking about prejudice and prejudice reduction. Indeed, social categorization is as central to contemporary work in intergroup relations (see also Brewer & Gaertner, 2001) as it was to Allport’s thinking about nature of prejudice. Although Allport’s analysis focused primarily on personality dynamics, he identified the central role of categorization, particularly in terms of the distinction between ingroups and outgroups. This distinction became the cornerstone for socialcognitive (Hamilton & Trolier, 1986), social-identity (Tajfel & Turner, 1979), and self-categorization (Turner, 1985) approaches to prejudice. In the process of categorizing people into groups, people typically classify themselves into one of the social categories and out of the others. Because of the centrality of the self in social perception, this distinction has a profound influence on evaluations, cognitions, and behavior. Perhaps one reason why ethnocentrism is so prevalent is because these biases operate even when the basis for the categorization is quite trivial, as when group identity is assigned randomly in laboratory experiments. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 545

It seems obvious that people would derogate outgroups in order to enhance the self. But recent research on self-esteem and prejudgment suggests that this holds for state (short-term) more than trait (long-term) self-esteem. One direction (from ingroup favoritism to self-esteem) shows that ingroup favoritism may make people feel better temporarily (Rubin & Hewstone, 1998), but not in the long run (Brown, 1995). — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 342

The self, ingroup, and outgroup overlap to varying degrees, depending on self-categorization. People define their ingroups by a process of self-anchoring, viewing the group as similar to the self. Consequently, self-evaluations predict ingroup evaluations, especially for people have a strong need for cognitive structure (Otten & Bar-Tal, 2002). This kind of self-anchoring plausibly underlies ingroup favoritism. Self-ratings predict ingroup favoritism better than does the positivity of the trait, suggesting that generalization from self to ingroup (i.e., self-anchoring), rather than a striving for positive ingroup distinctiveness, might underlie ingroup favoritism (Otten & Wentura, 2001). — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice, 340

Categorization

• QUESTION: This challenges the standard positive-distinctiveness account of ingroup favoritism; worth tracing how robust the evidence is that self-anchoring outweighs positive distinctiveness.
• XREF: Connects to classic minimal-group paradigm experiments (Tajfel) and to the general psychology-of-prejudice thread running through this anthology. — connects to: Mere group membership suffices to trigger self-esteem-linked favoritism. — Anthony G. Greenwald and Mahzarin R. Banaji, Implicit Social Cognition: Attitudes,…, 126
• corroborated: 6 independent passages support this claim — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 340; , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 545; , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 342 (+1 more)