Doctoral Dissertation Research in Political Science: The Political Implication of Motivation to Control Prejudice Reactions

政治学博士论文研究：控制偏见反应动机的政治含义

• 批准号: 9818714
• 负责人: Milton Lodge
• 金额: $ 0.78万
• 依托单位: SUNY at Stony Brook
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 1999
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1999-02-01 至 2001-01-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9818714&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Political; Science

My proposed research focuses on a major point of contention in political science, that is, the measurement of racial attitudes (Kinder 1986; Sears and Kinder 1985; McConahay 1986). [In layman's terms, an attitude is a feeling (usually positive or negative) about something.] I attempt to find a measure of attitudes about minorities that does not suffer from social desirability bias. Unbiased measures of attitudes toward minority groups are important to improve understanding and prediction of opinion toward public policies related to the minority groups in question. I propose a cognitive approach to address the problem of obtaining a true measure of people's attitudes toward minority group members. Using the accessibility of attitudes as an indicator of people's attitudes towards group members, I hope to develop a less biased measure of public opinion about minority groups. Specifically, I examine African-Americans and immigrants - Hispanic-Americans and Asian-Americans. I do this by expanding Fazio's individual difference scale which measures people's motivations to control their prejudiced reactions of blacks to these other groups (Fazio, Jackson, Dunton and Williams 1995; Dunton and Fazio 1997; Fazio and Dunton 1997). Fazio effectively demonstrates that controlling for this variable allows more accurate predictions of people's overall attitudes toward minorities and opinions about related political events. Consequently, we should be better able to predict sentiment toward public policies related to minorities. Public sentiment on policies dealing with minorities is largely determined by attitudes toward the group and its members (Schneider and Ingram 1993; Sniderman, Brody and Tetlock 1991; Kinder and Sears 1985). This is an important contribution in light of research showing the importance of public opinion in shaping public policy (Page and Shapiro 1992). Thus, this individual difference measure of motivation to control prejudiced reactions is developed to provide results in conjunction with non-reactive measures. Consequently, this self-report scale will provide a better understanding of people's racial attitudes without the complications of implementing non-reactive measures. I subsequently examine how these attitudes affect policy opinions. I propose to use this new measure to expand on a relatively unstudied area in political science -- public opinion about immigrants and immigration policy. First, I determine people's general attitudes toward different immigrant groups. Second, I test whether people's stereotypes about a group influence opinions about policies related to that group and immigrants as a whole. [Additionally, I investigate differences in these opinions when one group is made salient in subjects' minds. In other words, I examine whether exposure to hispanics versus Asians in juxtaposition with the ambiguous term, "immigrant," significantly affects opinions on immigration policy.] Third, I explore a self-report measure that asks individuals to take the perspective of a group member to determine people's racial attitudes (Barsalou 1989). Examining the differences between individuals' responses when asking them to relate their personal opinions and those of a typical group member should reveal prejudices. Finally, I hope to answer the previously unanswered question of who or what associations come to mind when individuals answer questions about immigration policy. [For instance, the National Election Study asks only general questions about immigrants and immigration policy and does not denote specifically the group to which it refers.] In short, I investigate who people are thinking about when they hear the term, "immigrants," and how that influences opinion on policies related to them. In sum, I propose to develop a better measures and, therefore, understanding of attitudes minorities and minority-related policies.

我提议的研究集中在政治学中的一个主要争议点，即种族态度的测量(Kinder 1986；Sears and Kinder 1985；McConahay 1986)。[在外行术语中，态度是对某事的一种感觉(通常是积极的或消极的)。]我试图找到一种不受社会期望偏见影响的对少数群体的态度。对少数群体态度的不偏不倚的衡量标准对于增进对与有关少数群体有关的公共政策的理解和意见的预测是重要的。我提出了一种认知方法，以解决获得人们对少数群体成员态度的真实衡量标准的问题。利用态度的可及性作为人们对群体成员态度的指标，我希望开发一种对少数群体的公众舆论不那么有偏见的衡量标准。具体地说，我考察了非洲裔美国人和移民--西班牙裔美国人和亚裔美国人。为了做到这一点，我扩大了法齐奥的个人差异量表，该量表衡量人们控制黑人对其他群体的偏见反应的动机(法齐奥、杰克逊、邓顿和威廉姆斯1995年；邓顿和法齐奥1997年；法齐奥和邓顿1997年)。法齐奥有效地证明，控制这个变量可以更准确地预测人们对少数群体的总体态度和对相关政治事件的看法。因此，我们应该能够更好地预测人们对与少数群体相关的公共政策的情绪。公众对涉及少数群体的政策的态度在很大程度上取决于对该团体及其成员的态度(Schneider和Ingram 1993；Sniderman，Brody和Tetlock 1991；Kinder和Sears 1985)。这是一项重要的贡献，因为研究表明公众舆论在制定公共政策方面的重要性(Page和Shapiro，1992)。因此，这种控制偏见反应的动机的个体差异测量是为了结合非反应性测量来提供结果。因此，这一自我报告量表将更好地了解人们的种族态度，而不会因实施非反应性措施而复杂化。随后，我考察了这些态度如何影响政策意见。我建议利用这一新措施来扩大政治学中一个相对较少研究的领域--关于移民和移民政策的公众舆论。首先，我确定了人们对不同移民群体的普遍态度。其次，我测试人们对一个群体的刻板印象是否会影响对该群体和整个移民政策的看法。[此外，我调查了当一组人在受试者心中变得突出时，这些观点的差异。换句话说，我考察了拉美裔与亚裔的接触是否会显著影响人们对移民政策的看法。]第三，我探索了一种自我报告的方法，它要求个人从群体成员的角度来确定人们的种族态度(Barsalou 1989)。考察个体在要求他们陈述个人观点时的反应与典型群体成员的反应之间的差异，应该会揭示出偏见。最后，我希望回答之前未回答的问题，即当个人回答有关移民政策的问题时，脑海中会浮现出谁或什么协会。[例如，全国选举研究只询问关于移民和移民政策的一般性问题，并没有具体说明它所指的群体。]简而言之，我调查了当人们听到“移民”这个词时，他们在想谁，以及这是如何影响人们对与他们相关的政策的看法的。总而言之，我建议制定更好的措施，从而了解少数群体的态度和与少数群体有关的政策。