Collaborative Research: A Multi-Method Approach to Stigma and Status Processes

地位和耻辱是影响个人在社会群体中组织方式的基本因素。地位是一个社会过程，在这个过程中，群体中的人将自己和他人置于影响力和威望的等级中。污名化是指社会群体成员认定某些属性是不可信的，从而使拥有这些属性的人受到社会排斥和排斥的过程。对群体中地位过程的研究已经确定了一些作为地位标志的属性，包括性别、种族、年龄和教育程度。对污名化过程的研究也确定了一些污名化的属性，包括精神疾病和身体残疾。近几十年来，关于耻辱感和地位的研究文献层出不穷，但它们或多或少是各自独立运作的。例如，在群体地位过程的研究中就没有精神疾病和身体残疾。反过来，对耻辱的研究通常不关注与地位相关的结果，如影响和绩效评估。研究人员将开展三项研究，以解决群体中地位和污名化过程之间的趋同和偏离问题。第一项研究是在马里兰大学完成的一项实验，调查对先前研究中确定为地位标志的属性（教育程度）的反应，被确定为耻辱的属性（各种类型的精神疾病），以及在研究中被确定为地位和耻辱标志的属性（种族）的反应，以确定对属性的重叠和分歧的方式。第二个项目将在哥伦比亚大学完成，研究人们对精神疾病患者的内隐态度。不像自我报告的态度测量需要个人的注意和控制，内隐态度的表达是自发和无意的。内隐测量的主要优点是，它们有能力克服在其他类型的态度测量中常见的社会可取性偏见。第三个项目是一项审计研究，旨在测试精神疾病在就业决策中的地位和耻辱相关结果。该研究包括将工作申请发送到招聘列表，不同的申请是否指定了精神病史。通过采用多种方法学方法以及代表两种传统的变量和措施，这三项研究有可能显著推动群体中地位和耻辱过程的独立研究文献。这些研究也有能力为旨在减少精神疾病耻辱的干预项目提供信息。尽管最近有几次呼吁采取干预措施来减少精神疾病的耻辱，但这些干预措施中的大多数都没有包括研究成分。因为最有可能成功的干预措施将以基础研究为基础，而且因为缺乏基础的干预措施可能导致资源浪费和对我们减少耻辱的能力的悲观情绪，因此拟议的研究代表了对消除精神疾病耻辱的更实用方法的重要补充。

Status and stigma are fundamental factors that influence the ways that individuals organize themselves in social groups. Status is a social process whereby persons in groups locate themselves and others in hierarchies of influence and prestige. Stigma is a process whereby members of social groups identify certain attributes as discrediting, subjecting those who possess them to social rejection and exclusion. Research on status processes in groups has identified a number of attributes that act as status markers, including gender, race, age, and education. Research on stigma processes has also identified a number of attributes that are stigmatizing, including mental illness and physical disability. The research literatures on stigma and status have both proliferated in recent decades, but they have operated more or less independently. Mental illness and physical disability, for example, are absent from research on status processes in groups. Research on stigma, in turn, does not typically attend to status-related outcomes such as influence and performance evaluations. The investigators will carry out three studies that address areas of convergence and departure between status and stigma processes in groups.The first study is an experiment to be completed at the University of Maryland to investigate responses to an attribute identified in prior research as a status marker (educational attainment), attributes identified as stigmatizing (various categories of mental illness), and an attribute identified in research as both a marker of status and stigma (race) in order to determine ways in which reactions to the attributes overlap and diverge. The second project, to be completed at Columbia University, is a study of implicit attitudes toward persons with mental illness. Unlike self-report measures of attitudes that require the attention and control of individuals, the expression of implicit attitudes is spontaneous and unintentional. The major advantage of implicit measures is that they have the capacity to overcome social desirability biases that are common in other types of attitude measures. The third project is an audit study to test for status- and stigma-related outcomes of mental illness in employment decisions. The study involves sending job applications to employment listings, varying whether the applications specify a history of mental illness.By employing multiple methodological approaches as well as variables and measures that represent both traditions, the three studies have the potential to significantly push forward the independent research literatures on both status and stigma processes in groups. The studies also have the capacity to inform intervention programs designed to reduce the stigma of mental illness. Although there have been several recent calls for interventions to reduce the stigma of mental illness, most of these interventions have not included a research component. Because the interventions with the highest likelihood of success will be grounded in basic research, and because poorly grounded interventions may result in wasted resources and pessimism about our ability to reduce stigma, the proposed studies represent an important complement to more applied approaches to eradicate the stigma of mental illness.