Department of Philosophy and Social Studies, University of Crete, Rethymnon, Greece.
Br J Soc Psychol. 2013 Sep;52(3):431-49. doi: 10.1111/j.2044-8309.2011.02094.x. Epub 2012 Feb 21.
Infrahumanization theory has claimed that groups tend to infrahumanize, and thus denigrate, each other irrespective of group status. However, research on infrahumanization has mainly addressed status in the context of national, ethnic, and regional divisions. The present studies tested the effect of group status in infrahumanization by employing occupational groups of varied status, both in abstract (blue-collar vs. white-collar workers) and specific terms (lawyers vs. shopkeepers, and high school teachers vs. university faculty members and primary school teachers). The results showed that only relatively higher status groups always attributed uniquely human emotions more to their in-group than to lower status out-groups. In contrast, lower status groups showed no bias in attributions of uniquely human emotions, or were biased in favour of the higher status out-group. The discussion of these results points to the role of consensus in the distribution of social value amongst groups of asymmetric status.
次人类化理论声称，群体倾向于次人类化，从而相互诋毁，而不论群体地位如何。然而，关于次人类化的研究主要集中在国家、民族和地区分裂背景下的地位。本研究通过采用不同地位的职业群体，在抽象（蓝领与白领工人）和具体术语（律师与店主，以及高中教师与大学教职员工和小学教师）中，检验了群体地位在次人类化中的作用。结果表明，只有相对较高地位的群体总是将独特的人类情感更多地归因于内群体，而不是较低地位的外群体。相比之下，较低地位的群体在归因于独特的人类情感时没有偏见，或者对外群体的较高地位存在偏见。对这些结果的讨论指出了共识在不对称地位群体之间的社会价值分配中的作用。
