The Antecedents and Implications of Intergroup Anxiety

这项拟议的工作考察了影响种族间相互作用过程的因素。对群际关系的研究强调了群际焦虑在决定人们对群外成员的反应方面的重要性。这项研究借鉴了偏见和社交焦虑文献中的理论，提出了一个关于种族间互动中焦虑的前因和含义的模型。具体地说，群体间焦虑的产生是由于缺乏与外部群体成员的积极经验，对种族间互动的负面预期，以及缺乏个人动机来回应而不偏向外部群体成员。此外，这种焦虑被认为会导致对外部群体成员的敌意加剧，并希望避免与外部群体成员互动，特别是在那些没有个人动机做出无偏见回应的人中。群体间焦虑会给人们的生活带来压力，并会导致回避性应对方式，这两者都会对人们的心理健康产生负面影响。回避群外成员可能会导致那些被回避的人产生社会孤立感，这会对心理和健康产生负面影响。此外，如果焦虑导致对群外成员的敌意，这种敌意可能会给群外成员带来压力，并威胁到他们的自尊。这项拟议的工作使用纵向调查方法和实验室实验来测试模型中的因果关系，通过制定策略和干预措施来检验，以减少焦虑以及种族间互动中伴随的回避和敌意。

The proposed work examines the factors that influence the course of interracial interactions. Research on intergroup relations has highlighted the importance of intergroup anxiety in determining people's responses toward outgroup members. Drawing upon previous theorizing from both the prejudice and social anxiety literatures, the proposed work offers a model of the antecedents and implications of anxiety in interracial interactions. Specifically, it is argued that intergroup anxiety results from a lack of positive previous experiences with outgroup members, negative expectation about the corse of interracial interactions, and a lack of personal motivation to respond without bias toward outgroup members. Further, this anxiety is posited to result in heightened hostility toward outgroup members and a desire to avoid interacting with outgroup members, particularly among people who are not personally motivated to respond without prejudice. Intergroup anxiety creates stress in people live's and can result in avoidant coping styles both of which have negative implications of people's psychological well-being. Avoidance of outgroup members can lead to feelings of social isolations among those people who are avoided, which has negative psychological and health-related implications. In addition, if anxiety results in hostility toward outgroup members, this hostility could be stressful for outgroup members and threaten their self-esteem. The proposed work tests the casual relationships in the model using a longitudinal survey approach and a laboratory experiment to examine by developing strategies and interventions to reduce anxiety and the concomitant avoidance, and hostility in interracial interactions.