People attribute uniquely human secondary emotions to out-group members less than to in-group members.

Evidence

In the late 1990s, Jacques-Philippe Leyens and his team at the Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium, conducted a series of normative studies investigating what it is that people think that make humans unique. Amid the usual suspects (language, intelligence), it was found that certain emotions are also attributed to humans to a much greater extent than to animals. These are called secondary emotions and include love, shame, guilt, or hope. The other emotions, called primary emotions, are seen as characterizing humans and animals alike. Examples are pleasure, anger, fear, and attraction (for a review, see Leyens et al., 2000). This taxonomy has been since used in a variety of studies that yielded support to Leyens’s original conjecture, namely, that out-group members are seen as less likely to experience secondary emotions, that is, the emotions that are uniquely human (Leyens et al., 2000). — Emanuele Castano, On the Perils of Glorifying the In-group, 38

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the primary/secondary emotion taxonomy and infrahumanization hypothesis at the core of this study.
• XREF: Connects to the infrahumanization literature and intergroup dehumanization research cited in related work on moral disengagement. — connects to: People attribute uniquely human emotions only to their own group — Cristian Tileagă, The Nature of Prejudice: Society,…, 641; Threatened groups deny outgroups distinctively human emotions — Walter G. Stephan, Oscar Ybarra, Kimberly Rios Morrison, Intergroup Threat Theory, 422; Group glorification increases emotional minimization of outgroup victims’ suffering. — Bernhard Leidner et al., Ingroup Glorification, Moral…, 50 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• People attribute uniquely human emotions only to their own group #contradicts (0.88) — Cristian Tileagă, The Nature of Prejudice, 641
• Threatened groups deny outgroups distinctively human emotions #corroborates (0.85) — Walter G. Stephan, Oscar Ybarra, Kimberly Rios Morrison, Intergroup Threat Theory, 422
• Group glorification increases emotional minimization of outgroup victims’ suffering. #expands (0.82) — Bernhard Leidner et al., Ingroup Glorification, Moral…, 50
• Groups are judged on perceived warmth and competence, which drive distinct emotions toward them #expands (0.72) — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice, 2272