Chapter 17. Pervasive Stereotype Accuracy<\/p>\n
Abstract<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/i><\/b>\u00a0\u00a0 This chapter reviews every high quality study of stereotype accuracy that I could find.\u00a0 It presents the evidence with respect to personal and consensual accuracy, using both correlations and discrepancy scores (see Chapter 16 for an explanation of what these are).\u00a0 It includes sections reviewing the empirical research on racial, gender, and other stereotypes. When the original studies addressed conditions under which accuracy was higher or lower, that, too, is included here.\u00a0 Furthermore, each study is critically evaluated, highlighting both its strengths and its limitations.\u00a0 Overall, this review indicates that the high quality, scientific research consistently shows that stereotype accuracy is one of the largest effects in all of social psychology.
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\n<\/i><\/b>EXCERPTS:<\/i><\/b>
\nWARNING: TURN BACK NOW, BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE
\nThis chapter contains contents that may be deeply upsetting to anyone committed to the view of stereotypes as inherently or generally inaccurate and irrational.\u00a0 If you have read this book continuously, you undoubtedly do not need these warnings and know what to expect.\u00a0 However, these warnings are necessary for anyone reading this chapter without reading the rest of the book.\u00a0 .
\nWarning I: DO NOT READ THIS CHAPTER without having first read Chapters 10-12, 15 and 16.\u00a0 You will need those chapters to understand what I mean by accuracy generally, and when I describe the results of the studies reviewed below as showing that people\u2019s beliefs were \u201caccurate,\u201d \u201cnear misses\u201d or \u201cinaccurate\u201d in this chapter.
\nWarning II: DO NOT READ THIS CHAPTER, unless you are willing to consider the possibility that stereotypes are often accurate. DO NOT READ THIS CHAPTER, if you think that merely considering the possibility that many of people\u2019s beliefs about groups (stereotypes) have a great deal of accuracy makes someone a racist, sexist, etc.\u00a0 DO NOT READ THIS CHAPTER if you believe that stereotypes are inherently inaccurate, flawed, irrational, rigid, etc., and this belief cannot be or should not be revised if empirical scientific data fail to fully support it.
\n…
\nWhat About Person Perception?
\nOK, so the scientific evidence does not justify concluding that stereotypes are pervasively inaccurate; instead, stereotype accuracy is one of the largest effects in all of social psychology.\u00a0 Before discussing the implications of these results, it is necessary to address one more \u201cYes, but\u2026\u201d.\u00a0 Specifically, \u201cYes, but what is really important about stereotypes is how they lead to biased judgments regarding individuals.\u201d
\nThis type of \u201cYes, but\u2026\u201d argument is fairly common in modern perspectives on stereotypes (e.g., Fiske, 2004; Nelson, 2002; Schneider, 2004; Stangor, 1995), and, in essence, engages in a major tactical retreat from perspectives that have emphasized stereotype inaccuracy in the past.\u00a0 It grudgingly acknowledges that, stereotypes are, in some sense, somewhat accurate for overall perceptions of groups, but goes on to imply that this is not very important.\u00a0 Instead, according to this tactical retreat, what is important is how people perceive and behave towards individual members of different groups.
\nI doubt that most proponents of this view would characterize it as any sort of \u201cretreat,\u201d let alone a \u201ctactical\u201d one.\u00a0 Nonetheless, I do so characterize it.\u00a0 That is because this view at least acknowledges that stereotypes as perceptions of groups may indeed sometimes be pretty accurate.\u00a0 As such, it constitutes a serious retreat from the overwhelming emphasis on inaccuracy that has characterized most of the social science discourse on stereotypes.
\nAt the same time, however, this \u201cyes, but\u2026\u201d can be viewed as \u201ctactical\u201d because it denigrates the importance of finding evidence of stereotype accuracy.\u00a0 As such, it allows the proponents of this view to maintain intact a view of stereotypes as \u201cgeneralizations gone rotten\u201d (Schneider, 2004) \u2013 not because they are inaccurate per se, but because of the allegedly awful and inappropriate ways people apply them when perceiving and judging individuals.\u00a0 \u201cYes stereotypes may not always be inaccurate, but let\u2019s get back to bias\u2026\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n
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