Prejudiced attitudes also serve group and system-justificatory functions beyond individual psychology

Evidence

As Allport has suggested, we should not just trust, or follow, our own sense of moral outrage, but ‘consult the ethos of a culture’ ( 1954 , p. 11), and consider the ‘moral evaluation placed by a culture on some of its practices’ (ibid., p. 11). But he considered this to be only secondary to what he believed to be primary: the functional and relative independence of prejudice as ‘negative, overgeneralized judgment’. He believed that we would be able to describe the variety and intensity of prejudiced attitudes by exploring their psychological function for the structuration of personality. He described prejudiced attitudes as a ‘psychological crutch for persons crippled in their encounters with life’ (ibid., p. 12). We know now that they can serve group (Tajfel, 1981b ) and system-justifi catory functions (Jost et al ., 2004 ) as well. It is these latter functions that have more far-reaching implications for understanding the social and societal nature of prejudices in society. — Cristian Tileagă, The Nature of Prejudice, 346

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces group-justification and system-justification as functions of prejudice beyond Allport’s individual ‘psychological crutch’ framing.
• XREF: Connects to the reader’s prior work on sacrifice stabilising stratified societies — system-justification as a mechanism doing similar cultural work. — connects to: the MOC “The Enemy-Making Machine: Ours, True, and the Identity That Defends Both”

Related

• Allport himself saw society and culture as shaping moral worth (similarity 0.83)
• Prejudice functions as a psychological crutch providing reassurance, guidance, and confidence (similarity 0.82)
• Prejudice persists because it serves psychological functions, not merely misperception (similarity 0.82)
• Understanding prejudice requires cultural, not merely psychological, analysis (similarity 0.82)
• Prejudice is a group-level status defense, not individual hostility (similarity 0.81)
• Prejudice arises from group identities rather than individual psychology (similarity 0.81)
• All prejudice involves intergroup relations with a built-in ingroup preference (similarity 0.80)
• Prejudice is explained by societal characteristics, not only individual traits (similarity 0.80)
• Prejudice can serve unconscious self-esteem needs people rationalize away (similarity 0.80)
• Prejudice is context-specific toward individuals, not a global attitude toward groups (similarity 0.80)
• Prejudice is primary; categorization only serves it (similarity 0.80)
• Understanding prejudice requires locating attitudes in collective symbolic contexts (similarity 0.80)
• Prejudice is public harm to esteem, not merely private attitude (similarity 0.79)
• Allport over-prioritized individual personality, missing later group-level and ideological explanations of prejudice. (similarity 0.79)
• Prejudice functions psychologically as a response to ego weakness and inner threat (similarity 0.79)