Prejudice theory abandoned emotion when it shifted focus from extreme bigots to normal people
Evidence
The change in theoretical focus from the 1950s to these newer perspectives stemmed in part from an implicit shift in the focal phenomenon under study. Both Allport (in his chapter on aggression and hatred) and the Authoritarian Personality researchers focused on the overt bigot – the Nazi, the Ku Klux Klan member – one who hates without compunction while feeling his hatred to be justified. Emotions, culturally viewed since the days of the ancient Greeks as irrational, naturally seemed an important part of explanations for these people’s disturbed thinking and despicable behavior. However, through the 1960s the research focus shifted gradually toward less extreme types of prejudice and more seemingly “normal” psychological processes. Learning stereotypes of outgroups from the surrounding culture and desiring esteem for one’s ingroups are processes that affect virtually all people, not only a handful of extreme bigots. In fact, one of the chief points of emphasis of both the stereotype-based and social-identity approaches was the normality of the psychological processes underlying prejudice, and the corollary fact that most people (even those who are fundamentally well-intentioned and liberal-minded) are at risk of succumbing to them. Emotions may have fallen out of favor in theories of prejudice in part because of this shift in focus from the extreme bigot to the more “normally” prejudiced person. — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice, 2253
The change in theoretical focus from the 1950s to these newer perspectives stemmed in part from an implicit shift in the focal phenomenon under study. Both Allport (in his chapter on aggression and hatred) and the Authoritarian Personality researchers focused on the overt bigot – the Nazi, the Ku Klux Klan member – one who hates without compunction while feeling his hatred to be justified. Emotions, culturally viewed since the days of the ancient Greeks as irrational, naturally seemed an important part of explanations for these people’s disturbed thinking and despicable behavior. However, through the 1960s the research focus shifted gradually toward less extreme types of prejudice and more seemingly “normal” psychological processes. Learning stereotypes of outgroups from the surrounding culture and desiring esteem for one’s ingroups are processes that affect virtually all people, not only a handful of extreme bigots. In fact, one of the chief points of emphasis of both the stereotype-based and social-identity approaches was the normality of the psychological processes underlying prejudice, and the corollary fact that most people (even those who are fundamentally well-intentioned and liberal-minded) are at risk of succumbing to them. Emotions may have fallen out of favor in theories of prejudice in part because of this shift in focus from the extreme bigot to the more “normally” prejudiced person. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 2253
Categorization
- XREF: Connects to the general arc of stereotype/social-identity literature and to Allport’s own framing of prejudice as ordinary rather than pathological.
- DEEPTHINKING: Beautifully explains why emotions dropped from prejudice theory: not because they were refuted but because the object of study changed from the pathological bigot to the normal person. This is genuinely paradigm-clarifying.
- corroborated: 3 independent passages support this claim — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice: Fifty Years…, 2253; , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 2253