Racial prejudice can be primed without explicitly racist appeals

Evidence

When attitudes involve inconsistent components, the external environment has the power to alter the expression of prejudice by heightening the salience of one aspect over the other (Katz, 1981). For example, experiments have shown how racial prejudice can be primed by different kinds of television news or political advertising (e.g., Valentino, Hutchings, & White, 2002). But overtly racist appeals may not be necessary to prime racial prejudice if ostensibly nonracial issues have been racialized, as “welfare” and crime have been (Gilens, 1999; Mendelberg, 2001). — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 2173

Categorization

• SEED: Article angle: how ostensibly race-neutral campaign language about welfare and crime functions as coded prejudice activation — and what this means for journalism that reports on such issues.
• XREF: connects to: Cross-racial amity can coexist with everyday racism without negating it. — Amit Singh, “Carnal conviviality” and the end of…, 59; Coded anti-public rhetoric can express racial fears without race words — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of…, 582