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 intelligence" stigma, irrespective of his or her actual level of cognitive
 ability.
 Individuals may be marked or stigmatized on the basis of a large number
 of characteristics, including race, skin color, height, weight, unattractive­
 ness, foreign accents, social class, intelligence, and personality (Goffman,
 1963; Jones et al., 1984). All of these characteristics are special cases of what
 Goffman (1963) viewed as three general bases for stigmatization: (a) abom­
 inations of the body (e.g., unattractiveness, deformities), (b) blemishes of
 character (e.g., mental illness, bizarre sexual proclivities, homosexuality,
 criminality, drug and alcohol addictions, and radical political views), and
 (c) tribal stigmas (e.g., race, nationality, and religion). Although Goffman
 (1963) considered these to be conceptually distinct types of stigmas, infor­
 mation about one type frequently serves as a basis for inferences about
 other types. For example, upon encountering a Black male, a White racist
 may view the target as being both unattractive and prone to criminal be­
 havior.



 SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL PROCESSES ASSOCIATED
         WITH STIGMATIZATION

 Because stigmatization results from a comparison of actual and virtual
 social identities, the psychological processes associated with it deserve
 consideration. Of particular relevance to the stigmatization process are the
 roles that categorization, stereotyping, expectation effects, and illusory cor­
 relation play in the inferences that observers make about targets (Fiske &
 Taylor, 1991; Jones et al., 1984). Research in the field of social cognition is
 concerned with the way in which information about a target is acquired,
 processed, organized, stored, and retrieved (Hamilton, 1976,1981 a; Hamil­
 ton & Sherman, 1994; Higgins & Bargh, 1987; Sherman, Judd, & Park, 1989).
 Categorization plays a central role in the inferences that observers make
 about a target (e.g., his or her traits). More specifically, when an observer
 encounters a target, a cursory consideration of his or her salient attributes
 (e.g., skin color, foreign accent, behavior) leads the observer to view the
 target as a member of a specific social group (e.g., neurotics). Interestingly,
 the categorization of the target is often based upon a consideration of only
 a few of his or her attributes.
 Stereotypes are beliefs and expectancies about members of social groups.
 They are often widely shared, overgeneralized, and typically not valid
 as concerns any specific member of a group (Ashmore & Del Boca,
 1981; Brewer & Kramer, 1985; Hamilton, 1976, 1981 a, 1981b; Hamilton &
 Sherman, 1994; Jones et al., 1984; Miller & Turnbull, 1986). Regrettably,
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