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An Age Apart: The Effect of Intergenerational Contact and
Stereotype Threat on Performance and Intergroup Bias
Dominic Abrams, University of Kent; Anja Eller, University of St. Andrews; and Jacqueline Bryant, University of Kent
Psychology and Aging2006, Vol. 21, no. 4, 691-702
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Stereotype Threat Theory Implied or explicit intergroup comparisons
can impair test performance This is because of the threat that a negative stereotype of
the ability of one’s group may be confirmed.
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Intergroup Contact Theory Under the right conditions, contact can
reduce intergroup prejudice
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Hypothesis A consequence of positive intergroup contact
could also be to change the implications of intergroup comparison, and thus moderate stereotype threat effects
Participants who had experienced more positive contact would be relatively unaffected by the threat manipulation, whereas those who had experienced less positive contact would be more anxious and perform less well in the high-threat than in the low-threat condition
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Independent Variables
Stereotype threat High, Low
Intergroup contact Relatively less positive, Relatively more positive
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Independent Variables Operational Definition:
Stereotype Threat Intergroup Contact
Theoretical Construct: Stereotype threat - tape recorded instructions Intergroup Contact - self-report (amount of positive contact with
younger people)
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Dependent Variables
Test Performance Anxiety Positive Intergroup Contact Intergroup Bias Ingroup Identification
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Dependent Variables Operational Definition:
Test Performance Anxiety Positive Intergroup Contact
Theoretical Construct: Test performance - Tests adapted from the Wechsler Adult
Intelligence scale – third revised edition, and the Cambridge Cognitive Examination – revised edition.
Anxiety - Osborne Positive Intergroup Contact – Series of measures measuring
quality of experiences of intergenerational contact
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Dependent Variables Theoretical Construct:
Intergroup Bias Ingroup Identification
Operational Definition: Intergroup Bias - six item general evaluation scale Ingroup Identification - seven point likert scale
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Participants 97 total participants
32 male, 65 female Retired, with ages ranging from 59-89 Ages ranging from 59-89 Defined as cognitively and socially active Live independently Live in the country of Kent, United Kingdom
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Procedure Threat manipulation
High: “Intelligence decreases with age, we want to see if old people perform more poorly on intelligence tasks than young people; both older and younger people will participate in this study.”
Low: No reference of intellectual abilities. “We want to see how people differ in response to different tasks; different types of people will take part in this study.”
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Procedure continued… Listen to a short tape recording of a man
describing himself Answer questions about the recording Told to remember the words apple, table and
penny Six digit-span items ranging from four to nine digits;
had to say them backwards Three ways in which three pairs of objects are alike Repeat the three words they were suppose to
remember earlier Brainstorm as many uses for scissors as possible
in 30 seconds
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Results
Anxiety is significantly related to performance (t = -.49)
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Results Continued…
Threat had a large significant effect on anxiety among participants with relatively less positive contact (.67), but its effect on those with relatively more positive contact was not significant (-.10)
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Participants who experienced more positive contact would be relatively unaffected by the threat manipulation, whereas those who had experienced less positive contact would be more anxious and perform less well in the high-threat than in low-threat condition
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TheThe main effect of Threat was not significant for intergroup bias, but the main effect of Contact was
Those who experienced less positive contact were relatively unaffected by threat
Participants who had experienced more positive contact reduced their levels of bias when they thought they were being compared with outgroup members.
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The Effects of Threat and Contact on Identification… Participants who experienced less positivecontact were relatively unaffected by Threat,but for those who experienced more positive contact, identification decreased in a high-threat situation
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Possible Changes/Improvements Recruit participants from other places (expand
population pool) Have participants from different age groups Break down the age groups differently, maybe
have more than just two groups Although they asked participants to state their age,
sex, marital status and occupation at retirement at the end of testing, they didn’t do anything with the information…incorporate that in somehow?