Chapter 19. Stereotypes Have Been Stereotyped!
Abstract
This chapter captures and summarizes some of the major themes and implications of the prior 4 chapters on stereotypes: 1) It highlights the broad and general conclusions, based on the scientific, empirical evidence on stereotype accuracy, that are and are not justified; 2) It highlights the prevalence of the “processistic fallacy” — of basing conclusions emphasizing stereotype inaccuracy on research that merely discovers (supposedly flawed) processes, but without actually assessing accuracy; 3) it reviews evidence on the “wisdom of crowds” to explain why consensual stereotypes are not the false cultural myths they are often accused of being, and, instead, are generally far more accurate than personal stereotypes; 4) It highlights limitations to existing empirical research on stereotype (in)accuracy; 5) It reviews the limited evidence on conditions under which high stereotype inaccuracy either has been found or is likely to be found; and 6) it introduces the “egalitarian denial” hypothesis which predicts that people highly motivated to be or appear egalitarian are those most likely to develop inaccurate stereotypes, because they will often underestimate real differences. This chapter also concludes that many social science perspectives on stereotypes are exaggerated, inaccurate, rigidly resistant to change in the face of relentless disconfirming evidence, and maintain their conclusions by virtue of a very selective focus on studies and findings that confirm the a priori belief in the irrationality and badness of stereotypes.
EXCERPTS:
A Brief Commentary: More Bias in Favor of Bias with Respect to the Terrraciano et al Study
In 2005, after the Terraciano study was accepted for publication but before it was actually published, I – along with scores, perhaps hundreds, of other psychologists – received an email from a very famous and prestigious Ivy League psychologist alerting us to the publication of this paper, which the author of the email declared to be “important.” Here I merely note several additional observations. I have never received from this psychologist – or, indeed any other psychologist – a mass notification of the importance of:
• The Heine et al article demonstrating that there was far more evidence of accuracy in Teracciano et al’s respondents’ perceptions of national character than Terraciano concluded.
• Any of the over 20 articles published from 1978-2005 demonstrating high accuracy in many social stereotypes (see Chapter 18 for the full review).
• Broad review articles concluding that the evidence shows stereotypes are often far more accurate than they are usually given credit for (e.g., Jussim et al, 2009; Ryan, 2002).
Apparently, at least in many social psychological circles, evidence of inaccuracy is so noteworthy that it warrants an email alert. Evidence of accuracy is, in contrast, apparently viewed as not worthy of the same sort of attention. As long as this sort of bias in favor of bias prevails, psychological scholarship will continue to create the distorted impression that people’s social beliefs are far less valid and rational than they actually are.
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What I am calling for here is not for my field to tout people as perfectly rational, but for a modicum of balance. Given that the bias side of the equation is well-recognized, this constitutes a call for also recognizing the evidence of high accuracy. If, after 90 years of proclaiming the inaccuracy of stereotypes to the world, when the evidence comes in showing that, overwhelmingly, people’s beliefs about groups are moderately to highly accurate, can we really just say “never mind”? Or do we owe it to the public, to our students, to our field, and to ourselves, to own up to the data and acknowledge that, however much our egalitarian goals motivate us to want to proclaim to the world the inaccuracy of stereotypes, that, in fact, dozens of studies now show that the beliefs about groups frequently held by lay people are usually quite accurate?
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Apparently, many social scientists’ beliefs about stereotypes are better understood as reflecting the psychological phenomenon discovered in Rettew et al’s (1993) research showing that people exaggerate other’s stereotypes, than as reflecting the scientific phenomenon of stereotype accuracy uncovered by the actual data. That is, many social science perspectives on stereotypes are exaggerated, inaccurate, rigidly resistant to change in the face of relentless disconfirming evidence, and maintain their conclusions by virtue of a very selective focus on studies and findings that confirm the a priori belief in the irrationality and badness of stereotypes. It is hard not to see some of this as irrational; some clearly is logically incoherent. In other words, stereotypes have been stereotyped!