Page 187 - Discrimination at Work The Psychological and Organizational Bases

CLEVELAND, VESCIO, BARNES-FARRELL
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1988) and (b) are motivated to preserve an egalitarian or nonprejudiced
self-image (e.g., Gaertner & Dovidio, 1986). Therefore, subtle racists (e.g.,
aversive racists, Gaertner & Dovidio, 1986; ambivalent racists, Katz & Hass,
1988; modern racists, McConahay, Hardee, & Batts, 1981) are motivated to
behave in a nonracist manner and are responsive to situational cues about
appropriate interracial behavior. When it is clear that race is a component
of an interaction (even as indicated by subtle situational cues; Biernat &
Vescio, 1993), subtle racists alter their behavior and control prejudiced re­
sponses (e.g., Gaertner & Dovidio, 1986).
Subtle or modern sexism, however, takes a different form. Rather than
sympathizing with women as victims of discrimination, inequity, and in­
justice, modern sexists (Swim, Aiken, Hall, & Hunter, 1995) deny that sex­
ism is a problem in contemporary society. In fact, Swim et al.'s modern
sexism scale comprises two kinds of items. Half of the items tap denial
that sexism is a problem in contemporary society. The other half tap anger
toward those who suggest sexism is a problem. Furthermore, although
subtle racists are particularly attentive to cues as guides for behavior in
interracial contexts, recent findings show that modern sexists are less able
to identify instances of sexist behavior, even when given instructions about
what they are looking for (e.g., sexist language). The inability of modern
sexists to identify sexist behavior as such likely exacerbates women's ex­
periences of patronizing behaviors.
Prejudice toward women is also different from racial prejudice, in that
there is typically a great deal of positive affect associated with the op­
posite sex. According to Fiske and her colleagues (Fiske, Cuddy, Click,
& Xu, 2002), stereotype content is derived from perceptions of the extent
that members of a particular group are perceived as threatening and in
competition with the ingroup. In this view, groups get what they deserve.
They get the status they deserve by virtue of their competence and they
get the relationship to the ingroup they deserve by virtue of their warmth.
The crossing of competence and warmth results in four cases of preju­
dice. Groups are perceived as (a) warm and competent, (b) warm, but
incompetent, (c) not warm, but competent, and (d) neither warm nor com­
petent.
The first and the fourth situations depict the prejudice in evaluations of
members of ingroups and outgroups. Ingroups are positively stereotyped,
reflecting both respect for and warmth toward the ingroup. Outgroups are
perceived in terms that reflect both disrespect and dislike (or lack of hu­
man qualities); they are low status outgroups that are perceived as draining
resources from the ingroup (e.g., people on welfare, poor people, home­
less people). The other two cases represent ambivalent perceptions of out­
groups. First, there are envied outgroups, who are stereotyped in terms that
imply competence, but that lack important human qualities (e.g., Asians,