Periodic Reporting for period 4 - MINDTOMIND (From mind to mind: Investigating the cultural transmission of intergroup bias in children)
Reporting period: 2022-07-01 to 2023-12-31
Prejudice and discrimination are pressing global problems. Across Europe and in the USA, the far right is on the rise, and individuals are often discriminated against on the basis of their membership in particular groups, for example their race, gender and/or sexual orientation. It is commonly supposed that younger generations display lower levels of prejudice than do older generations suggesting that these social problems may become less significant over time. However, empirical research demonstrates that the origins of these problematic attitudes and behaviour appear early in development, suggesting that we are passing on our biases to our children.
Understanding the origins of prejudice and discrimination requires interdisciplinary approaches from across the humanities and social sciences. In the MINDTOMIND project, we seek to contribute to this interdisciplinary mission by investigating how human psychology can lead to discrimination. In doing so, we hope to take one small step towards bringing about a fairer society.
We are interested in how best to characterise the psychological processes underpinning discrimination. We use a range of methods to address this question including experimental research, semi-naturalistic observation of social interaction, and content analyses of historical data.
We have a particular focus on the origins of prejudice and discrimination in development. In the MINDTOMIND project, we seek to understand how children’s learning environment interacts with other features of their psychology in order to lead to intergroup biases.
Thus far, we have published experimental research which incorporates the participation of 256 British children and 120 British adults. We have submitted papers that incorporate the participation of 120 further British children and 1,300 British adults. By the end of the project, we aim to submit papers that incorporate at least 50 more British children and 2,000 more adults.
Understanding the origins of prejudice and discrimination requires interdisciplinary approaches from across the humanities and social sciences. In the MINDTOMIND project, we seek to contribute to this interdisciplinary mission by investigating how human psychology can lead to discrimination. In doing so, we hope to take one small step towards bringing about a fairer society.
We are interested in how best to characterise the psychological processes underpinning discrimination. We use a range of methods to address this question including experimental research, semi-naturalistic observation of social interaction, and content analyses of historical data.
We have a particular focus on the origins of prejudice and discrimination in development. In the MINDTOMIND project, we seek to understand how children’s learning environment interacts with other features of their psychology in order to lead to intergroup biases.
Thus far, we have published experimental research which incorporates the participation of 256 British children and 120 British adults. We have submitted papers that incorporate the participation of 120 further British children and 1,300 British adults. By the end of the project, we aim to submit papers that incorporate at least 50 more British children and 2,000 more adults.
In one strand of research, we have been investigating how children learn to form first impressions of others. We know from previous research that, upon meeting a stranger, adults and children quickly jump to conclusions about whether or not that person is trustworthy or competent. These prejudiced first impressions have important social and economic consequences, for example, influencing hiring decisions and criminal sentencing. The mainstream view is that evolved features of human psychology make certain first impressions more likely – children are born with the capacity to distinguish leaders from followers and co-operators from defectors. In the MINDTOMIND project, we have refined and tested a learning based model of how first impressions from faces come about (the Trait Inference Mapping framework). Against this mainstream view, we argue that children learn to form these first impressions from exposure to the cultural messages common in storybooks, art, film, television and propaganda.
In one paper, we show that apparent evidence in favour of the nativist view is equally compatible with our learning-based account: learned first impressions appear early in development and occur quickly and automatically on meeting a new person. In further work, we investigate some of the ways in which learning occurs, demonstrating how children learn first impressions from observing the non-verbal behaviour of others and through social interactions with their primary caregivers.
In other research, we have investigated how children’s learning interacts with other features of cognition such as their motivation. Children are not merely passive recipients of information they receive from those around them, they seek out certain types of information over others. In the MINDTOMIND project we have built on our previous research showing that children prefer to read information that favours their own group and that this motivation to consume ingroup-favouring information influences their intergroup attitudes.
In another strand of research, we are interested in how best to characterise the nature of prejudice in adults. Previous research has suggested that adults tend to ‘dehumanise’ outgroups by denying them uniquely human mental states such as civility, rationality and warmth. Against this prevailing view, we have argued that outgroups are not denied uniquely human qualities, rather they are denied positive qualities. In a series of experiments with close to 2,000 participants, we have shown that whereas outgroup members are denied positive uniquely human qualities such as civility and refinement, they are attributed negative uniquely human qualities such as spite and arrogance.
Understanding how social learning interacts with other features of human psychology such as theory of mind and social motivation can help inform applied research on how to encourage fairer social behaviours. In a further line of work, we have shown that encouraging children to reflect upon particular mental states of outgroup members leads them to engage in more prosocial behaviour towards members of that group.
In one paper, we show that apparent evidence in favour of the nativist view is equally compatible with our learning-based account: learned first impressions appear early in development and occur quickly and automatically on meeting a new person. In further work, we investigate some of the ways in which learning occurs, demonstrating how children learn first impressions from observing the non-verbal behaviour of others and through social interactions with their primary caregivers.
In other research, we have investigated how children’s learning interacts with other features of cognition such as their motivation. Children are not merely passive recipients of information they receive from those around them, they seek out certain types of information over others. In the MINDTOMIND project we have built on our previous research showing that children prefer to read information that favours their own group and that this motivation to consume ingroup-favouring information influences their intergroup attitudes.
In another strand of research, we are interested in how best to characterise the nature of prejudice in adults. Previous research has suggested that adults tend to ‘dehumanise’ outgroups by denying them uniquely human mental states such as civility, rationality and warmth. Against this prevailing view, we have argued that outgroups are not denied uniquely human qualities, rather they are denied positive qualities. In a series of experiments with close to 2,000 participants, we have shown that whereas outgroup members are denied positive uniquely human qualities such as civility and refinement, they are attributed negative uniquely human qualities such as spite and arrogance.
Understanding how social learning interacts with other features of human psychology such as theory of mind and social motivation can help inform applied research on how to encourage fairer social behaviours. In a further line of work, we have shown that encouraging children to reflect upon particular mental states of outgroup members leads them to engage in more prosocial behaviour towards members of that group.
In the remainder of the MINDTOMIND project, we anticipate being able to provide further empirical support for the Trait Inference Mapping framework, investigating the nuances of how children form first impressions of others. We plan to bring multiple converging methods to bare on this question, supplementing experimental research in highly-controlled settings with semi-naturalistic work investigating how children communicate with their caregivers about the appearance and apparent character traits of others.
We look forward to further testing hypotheses from the literature on dehumanisation against our alternative explanation of how human psychology contributes to intergroup harm. We are planning a series of experiments that pit the various models of dehumanisation against our alternative view. Again, we plan to bring multiple converging methods to bare on this question, including experimental research with novel groups and real world groups as well as content analyses of historical data.
Taken together, this research will offer substantial progress beyond the state of the art, both in terms of theory development and empirical contributions. We seek to provide support for a novel perspective on the nature of prejudice, demonstrating that dehumanisation plays a much more limited role in explaining intergroup harm than widely assumed. We also offer a novel perspective on how prejudice develops, focusing on the importance of social learning and how it interacts with social motivation and theory of mind.
We look forward to further testing hypotheses from the literature on dehumanisation against our alternative explanation of how human psychology contributes to intergroup harm. We are planning a series of experiments that pit the various models of dehumanisation against our alternative view. Again, we plan to bring multiple converging methods to bare on this question, including experimental research with novel groups and real world groups as well as content analyses of historical data.
Taken together, this research will offer substantial progress beyond the state of the art, both in terms of theory development and empirical contributions. We seek to provide support for a novel perspective on the nature of prejudice, demonstrating that dehumanisation plays a much more limited role in explaining intergroup harm than widely assumed. We also offer a novel perspective on how prejudice develops, focusing on the importance of social learning and how it interacts with social motivation and theory of mind.