Brown's Definition Of Prejudice

Many psychologists have attempted to come up with a definition of prejudice: Collins Concise Dictionary (1985); Alport (1954); Jones, J.M (1972); Worchel et al (1988); Brown (1995) and although the wording differs there is a common theme: the underlying concept of attitudes, usually negative towards out groups or members of an out-group due to their membership.

For the purpose of this essay Brown, (1995) definition will be used, “the holding of derogatory social attitudes or cognitive beliefs, the expression of negative affect, or the display of hostile or discriminatory behaviour towards members of a group on account of their membership of that group.” (p.8)

In addition, essay will discuss prejudice in terms of negative attitudes therefore

Hamilton & Bishop (1976) found that living in and integrated environment or just, observing, without interacting with other ethnic groups can be enough to curb negative attitudes. Furthermore simply imagining these interactions (Crisp & Turner, 2009; Turner et al, 2007; Turner & Crisp 2010) or having friends that interacted with those minorities can be enough to diminish prejudice (Turner, et al 2008) social connectedness and interest in other communities is another factor (Brannon & Walton,

Early assumption were that prejudice is caused by ignorance and inaccurate perceptions, but Stephan & Stephan (1984) found only moderate correlations between knowledge and prejudice and Hewstone & Brown (1986) argued that knowledge is not as important as social categorisation and intergroup relations. Hamberger & Hewstone (1997) found that contact could intensify prejudices as ethnic minorities in the work place and possibly be seen as rivals regarding scare resources and jobs and that the contact did not represent any genuine bond. Furthermore there is a ‘disconnect’ between contact and generalization, improved attitudes in one interpersonal context don’t necessary generalize to different contexts (Harding & Hogrefe 1952; Minard 1952), although others have showed that contact with one group can, depending on the context limit prejudice directed at other groups also (Tausch, et al 2010).

Since interpersonal contact is of limited use for improving intergroup relations, Tajfelt’s work on the minimal group paradigms led to three social identity-based models that make recommendations for contact situations (Brewer & Miller’s De-categorisation Model 1984; Hewstone & Browns Intergroup Model 1986; Gaertner & Dovidio’s Common In-group Model 1990). Consequently through meta-analysis of contact research, it has been found that overall there is an effect of prejudice reduction due to contact (Brown & Hewstone 2005; Pettigew & Tropper