Stereotyping functions as profile construction for information processing under data scarcity or overload
Evidence
On the side of psychology Allport’s theory was heavily cognitivist, drawing on and further elaborating the notion of stereotypification advanced by gestalt psychologists and phenomenologists in the 1920s and 1930s. Stereotypes are here considered as a form of profile construction applied to information processing under conditions where there is either too much or too little data to work on. Stereotyping is regarded as both functional, in reducing cognitive dissonance between expectation and perception, and dysfunctional in reducing the flow of new information generated by social interactions. Stereotypes might be benign - and sustain positive images - or they might be negative, underwriting all manner of social discrimination, depending upon the circumstances in which they operated. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 1316
Categorization
Category: Definitional Content
- DEFINE: Provides a precise functional definition of stereotyping as information-processing under data conditions, not mere categorization.
- XREF: Connects to the reader’s existing knowledge of how institutions reduce information costs (Milgrom’s law merchant) — stereotyping as low-cost heuristic under information scarcity.