1 Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky.
2 Department of Psychology, Utrecht University.
Psychol Sci. 2017 Jan;28(1):92-103. doi: 10.1177/0956797616674999. Epub 2016 Nov 24.
Scholars have argued that opposition to welfare is, in part, driven by stereotypes of African Americans. This argument assumes that when individuals think about welfare, they spontaneously think about Black recipients. We investigated people's mental representations of welfare recipients. In Studies 1 and 2, we used a perceptual task to visually estimate participants' mental representations of welfare recipients. Compared with the average non-welfare-recipient image, the average welfare-recipient image was perceived (by a separate sample) as more African American and more representative of stereotypes associated with welfare recipients and African Americans. In Study 3, participants were asked to determine whether they supported giving welfare benefits to the people pictured in the average welfare-recipient and non-welfare-recipient images generated in Study 2. Participants were less supportive of giving welfare benefits to the person shown in the welfare-recipient image than to the person shown in the non-welfare-recipient image. The results suggest that mental images of welfare recipients may bias attitudes toward welfare policies.
学者们认为，反对福利的部分原因是对非裔美国人的刻板印象。这一论点假设，当人们想到福利时，他们会自然而然地想到黑人领取者。我们研究了人们对福利领取者的心理表征。在研究 1 和 2 中，我们使用了一种感知任务来直观地估计参与者对福利领取者的心理表征。与平均非福利领取者的形象相比，平均福利领取者的形象被认为（由另一个样本）更具有非洲裔美国人的特征，并且更能代表与福利领取者和非洲裔美国人相关的刻板印象。在研究 3 中，要求参与者确定他们是否支持向研究 2 中生成的平均福利领取者和非福利领取者图像中的人提供福利津贴。与非福利领取者图像中的人相比，参与者对福利领取者图像中的人提供福利津贴的支持度较低。研究结果表明，福利领取者的心理形象可能会影响对福利政策的态度。
