The debate surrounding the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court during September of 2018 raised a multitude of questions. Despite the allegations of sexual assault, much of the discussion surrounding the case was about the partisan nature of the Supreme Court and the individual biases of the two predominant political parties within American politics (Hetherington & Weiler 2018). Individual biases are more prominent than ever, with rampant use of social media creating an accessible space to express prejudice (Effron et al., 2018). This makes how the expression of individual prejudice can be influenced by group membership more imperative than ever.
People are often strongly influenced by the groups of which they are a member (Lickel et al., 2000). An important concept when comparing groups across society is entitativity; the perception of a group as being cohesive and unified (Effron, Kakkar, & Knowles, 2018). Lickel et al., (2000) studied the characteristics of groups that resulted in their perception as an entity or an entitative group. They found that the importance of the group, along with common goals and member similarity were all intercorrelated properties that determined the recognition of entitativity.
Lickel et al.,(2000) supported separate types of social groups; intimacy groups, social categories, task groups and loose associations. This was extended in Lickel, Rutchick, Hamilton, and Sherman, (2006) who state that entitativity was highest in intimacy groups followed by task groups, social categories, and loose associations respectively. Past research supports the perception that groups that are high in entitativity are regarded as more threatening than low entitativity groups due to their capability for collective action (Lickel et al., 2000).
Effron and Knowles (2015) posit that being a member of an entitative group empowers people to express prejudice against outgroup members. They state that increasing the entitativity of a group can increase how licensed their ingroup members felt to express their individual prejudice. Their study supported a boundary condition whereby participants had to have implicit bias initially for them to explicitly express their prejudice. They posit this boundary condition implies that when participants perceive their ingroup as highly entitative, they are disinhibited and explicitly state their bias.
Effron and Knowles (2015) also found that participants from outside an entitative group were more understanding of prejudice and discrimination when they were able to attribute it to membership within an entitative group. They found that increasing group entitativity decreased the moral condemnation associated with racial, national and religious bias. This was considered to be eminent when outgroup views could be seen to threaten ingroup thoughts as it appears to rationalize the prejudicial behaviour.
The findings of Effron and Knowles (2015) were extended in Effron et al., (2018). They found that the more entitative a group is perceived to be, the more responsible it is held for individual members prejudice. They argue that whilst this leads to condemnation of highly entitative group, it is highly advantageous for the individual members as it increases the individuals license to express prejudice. This increase in license decreases the moral condemnation their prejudice would normally attract.
Established research has consistent conclusions surrounding entitative groups (Lickel et al., 2000; Lickel et al., 2006) and the license membership extends to expressing prejudice (Effron et al., 2018; Effron & Knowles, 2015). Further research however, is required to establish why ingroup members of an entitative group feel licensed to express their prejudice. The present study would examine whether members of an entitative group perceive their individual prejudice as the collective responsibility of their entitative group.
Taking past research into account it is hypothesized that
Hypothesis 1:
It is predicted that an increase in group entitativity will correlate to an increase in an individual group members perception of collective responsibility.
Method
Participants
It is hoped that, congruent with past research (Effron et al., 2018; Effron & Knowles, 2015), we would study approximately 250 participants. We aim to invite engineering students from the University of Canterbury to participate in the study. The tentative use of engineers is due to their well publicised prejudice towards other degrees (Gattey & Redmond 2018).
Materials
Entitativity. The participants perception of entitativity would be measured using a six-item scale (Denson, Lickel, Curtis, Stenstrom, & Ames, 2006). The six-items will address a different component of entitativity; interaction, behavioural influence, norms, interpersonal bonds, shared knowledge, and common goals. Responses will be made on a scale from 1 not at all, to 7, very much so. EXAMPLE
Responsibility. The participants perception of responsibility will be measured using an adaptation of previous literature on collective responsibility (Effron et al., 2018). Participants will assign responsibility for prejudiced behaviors committed by a member of their own entitative group. Responses will be made on a scale of 0= the individual is completely responsible to 100= other members of the group are entirely responsible. EXAMPLE
Attention. Previous research has undertaken attention testing when conducting similar research to control for *** (Effron & Knowles, 2015; Effron et al., 2018). Participants will read a short paragraph that ends with instructions to write the word “group†and select the option labelled “collective†. This is an adaptation of previous research (Oppenheier, Meyvis, & Davidenko, 2009). Participants who fail to complete this task will be excluded from analysis.
Procedure
Participants will answer a series of correlational measures read and answer the six-item entitativity scale in regards to engineering. They then completed an attention measure to ensure **.
The dependent variable is the perceived group responsibility. It will then be measured using the responsibility scale, adapted from previous literature. After the dependent measure an attention check will then be undertaken again
Design
This study has a within-subject correlation design. The independent variable is group entitativity and the dependent variable is collective responsibility.
Discussion
As past research has found that an increase in entitativity correlates to an increase in license afforded to an individual to express their prejudice, it is expected that there will be a positive correlation between entitativity and collective responsibility felt by the individual.
The rampant use of social media has resulted in an increase individual prejudice being publicly expressed (Effron et al., 2018). The nomination of Brett Kavanaugh is a topical example of how individual biases*** This study would serve to demonstrate how entitativity can factor into how licensed an individual feels in expressing their prejudice.