Perceptual grouping of people enables but does not cause prejudice

Evidence

Krech and Crutchfield (1948) argued that “The grouping of people in perception does not, in itself make for racial prejudice – it merely makes such beliefs and attitudes possible” (p. 506, emphasis in original). They noted that social grouping can just as easily lead to favorable attitudes toward a group and argued that it is the “nature of the cue that supports the grouping” that is critical to whether or not racial prejudice follows. It is not the cue “black skin” that leads to prejudice, but rather, Krech and Crutchfield argued, the supporting or correlated cues of poverty, lack of education, and low social status. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 836

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the Law of Small Numbers and categorization work in Kahneman/Tversky and to Allport’s own ingroup/outgroup chapters. — connects to: Visual perception of a photo crowd can be distorted by political bias — Sander van der Linden, Foolproof: Why Misinformation Infects…, 109