Kurdi Benedek, Okura Keitaro, Hehman Eric, Ferguson Melissa J
Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT, 06511, USA.
Department of Psychology, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, IL, 61820, USA.
Sci Rep. 2025 Apr 30;15(1):15191. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-98384-3.
Of the 330 million residents of the United States, over 40 million were born abroad. Such individuals are routinely referred to using labels such as "alien," "foreigner," and "noncitizen." In this multimethod project relying on data from 5437 U.S. citizens in experimental studies and 193,649 U.S. citizens in archival studies, we examine implicit (automatic) evaluations of non-Americans in the United States, their effects on impression formation, and their ecological correlates in the form of real-life outcomes. In Studies 1A-1C, the labels "alien," "foreigner," and "noncitizen" were found to be highly and similarly implicitly negative. In Studies 2A-2D, applying these labels to specific individuals created immediate implicit negativity toward them, irrespective of their gender or race. Finally, pro-American/anti-foreigner implicit evaluations predicted anti-immigrant policy positions at the level of individuals (Study 3A), and a conceptually and statistically related implicit White-American/Asian-foreign implicit stereotype predicted anti-immigrant voting patterns in 18 relevant ballot initiatives at the level of U.S. counties (Study 3B). Across studies, implicit anti-foreigner bias generalized across participant demographics but was somewhat stronger among men and political conservatives. Together, this work highlights the cognitive underpinnings and real-world correlates of robust and pervasive anti-foreigner biases in the United States.
在美国的3.3亿居民中，超过4000万人出生在国外。这类人通常会被贴上“外国人”“外地人”和“非公民”等标签。在这个多方法项目中，我们利用实验研究中5437名美国公民的数据以及档案研究中193,649名美国公民的数据，考察了美国人对非美国人的内隐（自动）评价、这些评价对印象形成的影响以及它们在现实生活结果方面的生态关联。在研究1A至1C中，发现“外国人”“外地人”和“非公民”这些标签具有高度且相似的内隐负面性。在研究2A至2D中，将这些标签应用于特定个体时，会立即产生对他们的内隐负面态度，无论其性别或种族如何。最后，亲美/反外国人的内隐评价在个体层面预测了反移民政策立场（研究3A），并且一个在概念和统计上相关的内隐白人-美国人/亚洲-外国人刻板印象在美国各县层面预测了18项相关投票倡议中的反移民投票模式（研究3B）。在各项研究中，内隐的反外国人偏见在不同参与者人口统计特征中普遍存在，但在男性和政治保守派中略强。总的来说，这项工作凸显了美国强烈且普遍存在的反外国人偏见的认知基础和现实世界关联。
