Social Categorization at the Crossroads: The Mechanisms by Which Intersecting Social Categories Bias Social Perception

人们倾向于根据他们的社会类别成员身份来感知他人。因此，其他人会根据他们的性别、种族和年龄等因素进行分类。这些感觉迅速而容易地发生，它们是基于面部和身体的最小线索。先前的研究考察了观察者如何感知他人的社会类别成员身份，倾向于孤立单一的社会类别维度(例如性别)，而保持其他维度(例如种族和年龄)不变。然而，人类自然而然地同时落入多个社会范畴。因此，以前的研究只是对人们感知他人的方式提供了一种相当人为的描述。关于对一个社会类别的认知如何系统性地偏向于对其他社会类别的认知，我们知之甚少。这项研究项目系统地测试了导致社会知觉偏差的两条途径。首先，对一个类别的感知可能会对另一个类别的感知产生偏差，因为相同的面部和身体暗示可能同时是多个类别的特征。其次，对一个类别的认知可能会对另一个类别的认知产生偏差，因为与各种社会类别相关的刻板印象可能是相似的。由于共同的暗示，社会认知可能以“自下而上”的方式存在偏见，或者由于共同的刻板印象而以“自上而下”的方式存在偏见。为了更多地了解知觉和偏见的实际作用过程，研究人员将a)检查表征一个社会类别的面部和身体线索在多大程度上也是其他社会类别的有效线索，b)测试当感知者对其他自然属于多个社会类别的人形成印象时，特别是当对性别和种族类别的线索重叠时，感知者利用这些线索的程度，以及c)衡量社会刻板印象在这些过程中的作用。除了加强我们对社会知觉中的偏见的理解，这项研究还将创建涉及种族、性别和年龄特征的刺激档案，研究人员将免费获得这些档案。这项研究还将为在实验室工作的研究生和本科生提供培训和指导的机会。

People tend to perceive others in terms of their social category memberships. Consequently, others are categorized according to their sex, their race, and age among other things. These perceptions occur rapidly and readily, and they are based on minimal cues in the face and body. Prior research examining how observers perceive the social category memberships of others has tended to isolate a single social category dimension (e.g., sex) while holding other dimensions constant (e.g., race and age). Yet, human beings naturally fall into multiple social categories simultaneously. Thus, the previous research has only provided a rather artificial description of the way people perceive others. Very little is known about how the perception of one social category may systematically bias the perception of other social categories. This research project systematically tests two routes to biases in social perception. First, the perception of one category may bias the perception of another category because the same face and body cues may be characteristic of multiple categories simultaneously. Second, the perception of one category may bias the perception of another category because the stereotypes associated with various social categories may be similar. Social perceptions may be biased in a "bottom-up" fashion due to common cues or in a "top-down" fashion due to common stereotypes. In order to learn more about how these processes in perception and bias actually work, the researcher will a) examine the extent to which face and body cues that characterize one social category are also valid cues for other social categories, b) test the extent to which perceivers utilize these cues when they form impressions of others that naturally fall into multiple social categories, specifically when cues to sex and race categories overlap, and c) measure the role of social stereotypes in these processes.In addition to enhancing our understanding of biases in social perception, the research will result in the creation of stimulus archive involving race, gender and age traits that will be made freely available to researchers. This research will also provide opportunities for training and mentorship for both graduate and undergraduate students working in the lab.