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Attitudes and stereotypes

Individual dynamics:
Sessions 5 & 6 Attitudes
PGP I 2007-2008, Sections C & D
See written hand-out

Prof. P. D’Cruz

Definition Work related attitudes

• Evaluative reaction which is either • Workplace commitment
positive or negative toward something or • Job satisfaction
someone that we reveal in our thoughts,
feelings, or intended actions toward that
person or thing
– Could sometimes be ambivalent too
• See written hand-out distributed in class
for further details

Doing his share

• Trace the changes in Ralph’s attitude
keeping in mind attitude object, valence
and intensity Stereotypes
• Analyse Ralph’s attitudes in terms of
cognitive, affective and behavioural
components
• What accounts for the changes in Ralph’s
attitude?

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Attitude (cog/beh/aff) • Prejudice – attitude (usually negative) towards

the members of some group, based solely on
their membership in that group
– Functions as a schema
– Works on automatic processing/in an implicit manner
Prejudice – Tend to evaluate members of the group negatively
merely because they belong to that group, rather than
Affective looking at them as individuals
Cognitive – Behavioural –
Stereotype • Discrimination – negative actions towards
Discrimination
groups that are the target of prejudice

• Stereotypes – beliefs that all members of a • Roots of prejudice and stereotypes

particular group show certain ‘typical’ – Social categorisation
traits • In-group and out-group
• Operate as schemas do • In-group heterogeneity and out-group
homogeneity
• Labelling, scapegoating and self-fulfilling – Social learning
prophecies/pygmalion effect – Realistic conflict hypothesis
– Judge people prematurely • Social networks and scarce resources

• Reducing prejudice and stereotypes • Schema - Mental frameworks that allow

– Unlearning (introspection and questioning of
the reified) and relearning
– Contact hypothesis
– Recategorising
• Prejudice and stereotypes at work
– The relevance of diversity
– Shared goals, shared identity and OD
interventions – contact hypothesis and
recategorising
us to organise and process large amounts
of information in an efficient manner,
operating as mental short-cuts which help
us reduce the effort we put in to
understand the social world and preserve
cognitive capacity
• As a result of schema, mental processes
proceed on ‘automatic’ and appear to be
implicit

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• Schemas influence what we pay attention

to (filters) and hence could block
rationality and produce distortions
• Schemas are generally difficult to change
even in the presence of contradictory data
• Attitudes are a type of schema