Ingroup-outgroup differentiation and devaluation of outgroups
Recent research in psychology has shown that human beings have a tendency to divide the world into “us” and “them.” They use seemingly trivial information to create ingroups and outgroups and then discriminate against members of the outgroup. Being told that an aesthetic preference test shows that they prefer the modern painter Klee is sufficient for people to favor others who supposedly also like Klee and discriminate against those who like another modern painter, Kandinsky. Even totally arbitrary and trivial differentiations have such effects.34
Once.. .a group of thirty-two young boys from the suburbs of Bristol, England, had an out-of-the-ordinary experience. It began simply: They sat together in groups of eight and watched dots flash on a screen. Working individually, they were to guess the number of dots that flashed before their eyes. When all of the guessing was done, four of the boys from each octave were taken aside and told that they belonged to a group of people who tend to overestimate in this kind of guessing. The remaining four boys were told that they belonged to a group of people who tend to underestimate. These bogus group categorizations, so seemingly banal and trivial, had important effects on the Bristol boys’ subsequent behavior.
After learning that he was either an overestimator or an underestimator, each boy was given the opportunity to decide how a quantity of money should be divided between two other boys. He was told that no one would know who made the decision and that his own earnings would be unaffected by the allocation. About the two others the Bristol boys knew only one thing: that one was an overestimator and the other was an underestimator. It was not much to know, but it was enough: The money was not divided equally. The Bristol boys discriminated in favor of the boy who shared their social category and against the one who did not.35
Seemingly, people use available information to divide themselves into an ingroup and an outgroup.36 Obviously, people group themselves in many ways and can define those who belong to their nation, political party, religion, profession, neighborhood, or local Parent-Teacher Association as “us,” and they may consider others who do not belong to their group as different and less worthy. But the ties that bind people to significant ingroups are much stronger than this: deep affective associations, shared understandings, common goals, and the perception of a shared fate. The tendency to form ingroups and ethnocentrism are deeply rooted; they evolve out of genetic predispositions, or “building blocks.”
The capacity of infants to form attachment to caretakers is rooted in genetic makeup. Although the quality of attachment varies, only under extreme conditions will infants form none.37 At the same time they develop attachment, infants also develop stranger anxiety, a fear and/or avoidance of unfamiliar people. This may be a rudimentary source of ingroup-outgroup differentiation. Socialization and experience at this time of life have substantial effects. Infants show less stranger anxiety if they are exposed to a wide variety of people or develop a secure (rather than avoidant or anxious/ambivalent) attachment to caretakers.38
Psychologists have long believed that the earliest relationship to the primary caretaker is a prototype for later relationships. Research findings in the last decade show that infants who develop a secure attachment – as indicated by a loving connection with neither undue distress about the caretaker’s absence nor anger or avoidance on the caretaker’s return – have a closer, more positive, more effective relationship with their peers during the preschool and early school years.39 This connection to others inherent in secure attachment is an important basis for empathy and caring. Its range may be limited by ingroup-outgroup differentiation; caring may be restricted to those who are “similar,” accepted, and valued.
Related sources of ingroup-outgroup differentiation are fear as a common human response to the unusual, unknown, and different and the tendency to like and prefer what is familiar – even among nonsense syllables.40
Psychologically, the crux of the matter is that the familiar provides the indispensable basis of our existence. Since existence is good, its accompanying groundwork seems good and desirable. A child’s parents, neighborhood, region, nation are given to him – so too his religion, race, and social traditions. To him all these affiliations are taken for granted. Since he is part of them, and they are part of him, they are good.41
A further source of ethnocentrism is the fact that the human mind works by categorization. We see and remember objects and people as green or red, tall or short. We would be overwhelmed by uncertainty and anxiety if we approached each person (or event) without using past learning as a guide. Categorization, however, is a basis of stereotypes, exaggerated beliefs about groups that are often negative.
Because of attachment and stranger anxiety, children automatically tend to differentiate between their primary group, the family, and the rest of the world. Socialization may intensify this. Children are often taught to mistrust those outside the family and are often indoctrinated against religious, ethnic, national, or political outsiders. At a very early age they come to evaluate their own nation positively and express stereotypic and negative views of other nations. A nine-year-old Swiss boy, when asked where he learned such opinions as “The French are not very serious,... and it is dirty there,” and “Russians always want war,” answered: “I don’t know. I’ve heard it... .that’s what people say.”42
Having learned such differentiations, people constantly create new ingroup-outgroup distinctions, which are reinforced by feelings of group harmony and other gratifications. One function of warfare may be to redirect aggression away from the ingroup and thereby protect genetically related ingroup members.43 Leaders also create divisions to rally a dissatisfied population.44
The preparation of official or sanctioned torturers and murderers often includes creation of a strong ingroup bond and differentiation from the rest
