The effects of minorities’ collective action on their perception and acceptability of expressing prejudice against them

Grounded in the psychological theories of social change, Stereotype Content Model (Fiske et al., 2002), Intergroup Threat Theory (Stephan & Stephan, 2000) and the Group Norm Theory (Sherif & Sherif, 1953), this dissertation presents a thorough empirical test of a process through which collective action of minority members influences the acceptability of prejudice expression against them. In a line of six studies – three correlational (overall N = 5576), one archival and two experimental (overall N = 873) – we test the hypothesis that acting minority groups are perceived as more competent and, as a result, are more likely to be protected by social norms proscribing expression of prejudice against them. Results of three correlational studies show that individuals who perceive minority groups as acting on behalf of their rights are more likely to proscribe expression of prejudice against them. The reason for that is they find the members of minority groups to be more competent and, to a smaller extent, warmer. The evidence from archival study and experimental studies partially replicates those results. In archival study we show that in the time of one of the largest social movements in history – the Civil Rights Movement – the language used to describe Black minority in the media in the United States improved, and that peaceful protests were partially responsible for this change. Results of experimental studies suggest that peaceful collective action does, indeed, have a potential to improve the perception of minority groups and, in result, change the social norms proscribing expression of prejudice against them. What seems to matter a lot, however, are the initial attitudes toward discrimination against a group. Overall, obtained results suggest that the two models of social change broadly regarded by psychologist as contradictory routes to achieving change – the prejudice reduction model and collective action model – may, in fact, represent complimentary, if not serial processes, with collective action preceding prejudice reduction interventions. Implication of the findings, future directions and limitations of the presented studies are discussed.