Warmth and Competence as Universal Dimensions of Social Perception: The Stereotype Content Model and the BIAS Map

The Density of the Big Two

Communion and agency are fundamental dimensions of social perception and judgment. Previous research revealed a primacy of communion in social information processing. The present research investigates whether there is a similar asymmetry in the “density” of communion and agency. We test whether communal content is more densely clustered in memory than agentic content, that is, more similar to other communal content than agentic content is similar to other agentic content. Three multidimensional scaling studies address this question and suggest an interaction with valence: While negative communal content is more densely clustered than negative agentic content, we find no differences in density between positive communal and positive agentic content. In addition to enhancing our understanding of the fundamental dimensions and their structural representation, this research might open a new perspective on old questions regarding person perception and implicit personality theories.

Memory and Self-Esteem

The double perspective model (DPM) assumes that every social interaction involves two perspectives – that of the agent (a person who performs an action) and that of the recipient (a person toward whom the action is directed). Agency and communion constitute two basic dimensions of social cognition because they denote these two perspectives. In effect, interpersonal evaluations (made from the recipient perspective) are dominated by communal over agentic content. The present study experimentally showed that self-evaluations (made from the agentic perspective) are dominated by agentic over communal content. Participants were primed with negative or positive information involving agency or communion of the self or another person. Whereas the global evaluation of others was influenced by both agentic and communal primes, the global evaluation of self (self-esteem) was influenced by agentic but not communal primes. These findings are discussed as an evidence for DPM.

The Influence of the Big Two

The present article concerns the relationship of the Big Two with generalized negative worldviews (i.e., negative beliefs about human nature and pessimistic expectations of interpersonal relationships). Morality/communion and competence/agency – in the form of generalized judgments concerning other people’s attributes – may be a substantial basis for formulating negativistic beliefs about the social world. Because people automatically adopt the recipient’s perspective rather than that of the active agent while processing information, the communal/moral qualities of other people are profitable for them, while their competence/agency qualities are profitable for the actor. On the basis of these considerations we formulated the following hypotheses: (1) High morality/communion judgments of people in general are inversely related to negativistic worldviews, and high competence/agency judgments are directly related to negativistic worldviews. (2) Low morality/communion judgments together with high competence/agency judgments correlate with the most negativistic worldviews. (3) The relationships stated in Hypothesis (1) holds for the perception of people in general, but not for members of one’s own family. These hypotheses were tested and partly supported in a representative sample of adult Poles (n = 853).

Think manager--think male in adolescents and its relation to sexism and emotions in leadership

From the perspective of the Think manager--think male, this study was conducted to examine the type of leadership role depending on gender in a sample of 158 Spanish adolescents -according to three types of leaders: "male middle leader", "female middle leader" and "middle leader in general". The kind of emotional expression (positive and negative) evoked by their leadership behaviors (task- and relationship- oriented) was also analyzed. Lastly, whether adolescents' sexist beliefs affected the attribution of traits and the emotional expression towards these leaders was examined. Results showed that task-oriented traits were more characteristic of the leadership role than relationship-oriented traits. Adolescents expressed more positive emotions towards a task-oriented leader and towards a leader behaving in ways associated with both task- and relationship- oriented styles, but only for men. Finally, hostile sexism predicted fewer task-oriented traits to female leaders, more negative affect towards task-oriented male leaders and towards counter-stereotypic leaders. These results were moderated by the sex of adolescents.

Group status, perceptions of agency, and the correspondence bias: Attributional processes in the formation of stereotypes about high and low status groups

The Stereotype Content Model proposes that competence (or alternatively, agency) is a fundamental dimension of stereotypes. According to this model, beliefs about agency are partially due to the status relations between groups, such that high status groups are perceived to possess agency, whereas low status groups are perceived to lack agentic characteristics. Despite the considerable support for this model, the psychological processes that produce these stereotypes have not been fully explored. In the current studies, we examined whether the correspondence bias may be partially responsible for the stereotype that members of low status groups lack agentic characteristics, relative to those who belong to high status groups. Across both studies, a measure of the correspondence bias predicted such stereotypical beliefs, even after accounting for variables that are known to be associated with beliefs about high and low status groups. This effect was observed when beliefs about the status of groups were experimentally manipulated, and when we measured stereotypical beliefs about two sets of actual high and low status groups.

Nations' income inequality predicts ambivalence in stereotype content: how societies mind the gap

Income inequality undermines societies: The more inequality, the more health problems, social tensions, and the lower social mobility, trust, life expectancy. Given people's tendency to legitimate existing social arrangements, the stereotype content model (SCM) argues that ambivalence-perceiving many groups as either warm or competent, but not both-may help maintain socio-economic disparities. The association between stereotype ambivalence and income inequality in 37 cross-national samples from Europe, the Americas, Oceania, Asia, and Africa investigates how groups' overall warmth-competence, status-competence, and competition-warmth correlations vary across societies, and whether these variations associate with income inequality (Gini index). More unequal societies report more ambivalent stereotypes, whereas more equal ones dislike competitive groups and do not necessarily respect them as competent. Unequal societies may need ambivalence for system stability: Income inequality compensates groups with partially positive social images.

The Social Cognition of Social Foraging: Partner Selection by Underlying Valuation

Humans and other animals have a variety of psychological abilities tailored to the demands of asocial foraging, that is, foraging without coordination or competition with other conspecifics. Human foraging, however, also includes a unique element, the creation of resource pooling systems. In this type of social foraging, individuals contribute when they have excess resources and receive provisioning when in need. Is this behavior produced by the same psychology as asocial foraging? If so, foraging partners should be judged by the same criteria used to judge asocial patches of resources: the net energetic benefits they provide. The logic of resource pooling speaks against this. Maintaining such a system requires the ability to judge others not on their short-term returns, but on the psychological variables that guide their behavior over the long-term. We test this idea in a series of five studies using an implicit measure of categorization. Results showed that (1) others are judged by the costs they incur (a variable not relevant to asocial foraging) whereas (2) others are not judged by the benefits they provide when benefits provided are unrevealing of underlying psychological variables (despite this variable being relevant to asocial foraging). These results are suggestive of a complex psychology designed for both social and asocial foraging.

You Give Me the Chills

In the research reported here, we investigated how suspicious nonverbal cues from other people can trigger feelings of physical coldness. There exist implicit standards for how much nonverbal behavioral mimicry is appropriate in various types of social interactions, and individuals may react negatively when interaction partners violate these standards. One such reaction may be feelings of physical coldness. Participants in three studies either were or were not mimicked by an experimenter in various social contexts. In Study 1, participants who interacted with an affiliative experimenter reported feeling colder if they were not mimicked than if they were, and participants who interacted with a task-oriented experimenter reported feeling colder if they were mimicked than if they were not. Studies 2 and 3 demonstrated that it was not the amount of mimicry per se that moderated felt coldness; rather, felt coldness was moderated by the inappropriateness of the mimicry given implicit standards set by individual differences (Study 2) and racial differences (Study 3). Implications for everyday subjective experience are discussed.

Under the radar: how unexamined biases in decision-making processes in clinical interactions can contribute to health care disparities

Several aspects of social psychological science shed light on how unexamined racial/ethnic biases contribute to health care disparities. Biases are complex but systematic, differing by racial/ethnic group and not limited to love-hate polarities. Group images on the universal social cognitive dimensions of competence and warmth determine the content of each group's overall stereotype, distinct emotional prejudices (pity, envy, disgust, pride), and discriminatory tendencies. These biases are often unconscious and occur despite the best intentions. Such ambivalent and automatic biases can influence medical decisions and interactions, systematically producing discrimination in health care and ultimately disparities in health. Understanding how these processes may contribute to bias in health care can help guide interventions to address racial and ethnic disparities in health.

Examining Concurrent and Longitudinal Relations Between Personality Traits and Social Well-being in Adulthood

Past work has demonstrated that Big Five personality traits both predict relationship success and respond to changes in relationship status. The current study extends this work by examining how developments on the Big Five traits correspond to another important social outcome in adulthood, social well-being. Using the Mid-Life Development in the U.S. longitudinal data sample of adults, the authors examined traits and social well-being at two time points, roughly 9 years apart. Results find support for two primary claims. First, initial levels of social well-being correlated positively with initial standing on extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability, and openness. Second, changes in social well-being over time coincided with changes on these traits, in the same directions. Taken together, these findings provide broad support that trait development and social well-being development coincide during adulthood.

Managing ambivalent prejudices: The smart-but-cold, and the warm-butdumb sterotypes

Not all biases are equivalent, and not all biases are uniformly negative. Two fundamental dimensions differentiate stereotyped groups in cultures across the globe: status predicts perceived competence, and cooperation predicts perceived warmth. Crossing the competence and warmth dimensions, two combinations produce ambivalent prejudices: pitied groups (often traditional women or older people) appear warm but incompetent, and envied groups (often nontraditional women or outsider entrepreneurs) appear competent but cold. Case studies in ambivalent sexism, heterosexism, racism, anti-immigrant biases, ageism, and classism illustrate both the dynamics and the management of these complex but knowable prejudices.

Does status affect intergroup perceptions of humanity?

Across three studies, we examined whether ingroup status may affect intergroup perceptions of humanity. In Studies 1 and 2, we considered real groups: Northern versus Southern Italians; in Study 3, we manipulated the socioeconomic status of two minimal groups. In all studies, members of higher status groups perceived the ingroup as more human than the outgroup, while members of lower status groups did not assign a privileged human status to the ingroup. Such findings were obtained using different implicit techniques: the Implicit Association Test (IAT) and the Go/No-go Association Task (GNAT). Further, results suggest that the different perceptions of humanity may depend on the stereotypic traits generally ascribed to higher and lower status groups. The implications of results for infrahumanization research are discussed.

Changing stereotype content through mental imagery: Imagining intergroup contact promotes stereotype change

Research has recently shown that imagining intergroup contact can reduce hostility toward outgroups. The present experiment explored whether imagining intergroup contact leads to more positive perceptions of outgroups differentially stereotyped on the two fundamental dimensions of social perception, namely warmth and competence. Depending on the experimental condition, participants ( N = 123) imagined either an intergroup encounter with an outgroup member rated as high (vs. low) on warmth and competence or an outdoor scene. Results showed that imagining an intergroup encounter enhances warmth and competence perception of dehumanized groups, and promotes the perception of warmth and competence of envied and paternalized groups, respectively. These findings suggest that imagined contact could promote positive intergroup relationships toward a wide range of social groups, even dehumanized groups.

Friend or Foe, Champ or Chump? Social Conformity and Superiority Goals Activate Warmth-Versus Competence-Based Social Categorization Schemas

Evaluations of individuals and social groups refer to two basic dimensions of social judgment: warmth and competence. Although previous research has explored the antecedents and consequences of these evaluations, there is a lack of understanding of the conditions under which warmth and competence information is used for social categorization in the first place. The present research developed a novel measure of individuals’ tendencies to categorize persons in terms of competence versus warmth and tested whether these tendencies are predicted by chronic (Study 1, N = 301) and experimentally induced (Study 2, N = 69) social conformity and superiority goals. Social conformity goals predicted greater relative use of warmth information, while superiority goals predicted greater relative use of competence information in categorizing persons. These findings attest to the relevance of chronic as well as contextually induced goals at an early stage of social information processing related to social categorization.

The effect of stereotype content on anger versus contempt in “day-to-day” conflicts

Depending on how involved parties appraise day-to-day conflicts, they either may feel angry or contemptuous toward the other party, which, in turn, may result in stronger confronting or avoiding intentions. In this paper we investigated how the content of stereotypes associated with the group to which an outgroup perpetrator belongs affects appraisals, emotions, and behavior. In two experiments, we demonstrated that stereotyping an outgroup as less warm resulted in increased feelings of anger, and tendencies to react forcefully toward an outgroup party in a conflict. Specifically, this effect of low stereotype warmth was explained by increased appraisals of negative intentions. Stereotyping an outgroup as less competent in the same situation elicited increased feelings of contempt, and tendencies to avoid an outgroup party in a conflict. This effect of stereotype incompetence was due to decreased appraisals of control over the other party.

Bounded empathy: neural responses to outgroup targets' (mis)fortunes

The current study investigates whether mere stereotypes are sufficient to modulate empathic responses to other people's (mis)fortunes, how these modulations manifest in the brain, and whether affective and neural responses relate to endorsing harm against different outgroup targets. Participants feel least bad when misfortunes befall envied targets and worst when misfortunes befall pitied targets, as compared with ingroup targets. Participants are also least willing to endorse harming pitied targets, despite pitied targets being outgroup members. However, those participants who exhibit increased activation in functionally defined insula/middle frontal gyrus when viewing pity targets experience positive events not only report feeling worse about those events but also more willing to harm pity targets in a tradeoff scenario. Similarly, increased activation in anatomically defined bilateral anterior insula, in response to positive events, predicts increased willingness to harm envy targets, but decreased willingness to harm ingroup targets, above and beyond self-reported affect in response to the events. Stereotypes' specific content and not just outgroup membership modulates empathic responses and related behavioral consequences including harm.

You want to give a good impression? Be honest! Moral traits dominate group impression formation

Research has shown that warmth and competence are core dimensions on which perceivers judge others and that warmth has a primary role at various phases of impression formation. Three studies explored whether the two components of warmth (i.e., sociability and morality) have distinct roles in predicting the global impression of social groups. In Study 1 (N= 105) and Study 2 (N= 112), participants read an immigration scenario depicting an unfamiliar social group in terms of high (vs. low) morality, sociability, and competence. In both studies, participants were asked to report their global impression of the group. Results showed that global evaluations were better predicted by morality than by sociability or competence-trait ascriptions. Study 3 (N= 86) further showed that the effect of moral traits on group global evaluations was mediated by the perception of threat. The importance of these findings for the impression-formation process is discussed.

Social categorization in interpersonal negotiation: How social structural factors shape negotiations

Social categorization is a powerful determinant of social behavior. As group membership becomes salient, individuals come to behave as group members and, consequently, appraise interactions according to these salient group identities (Turner, 1987). The aim of the present article is to investigate the impact of social categorization on perceptions and appraisals of a distributive negotiation situation. An experiment is presented in which social categorization of the negotiation partner is manipulated. Results revealed that the social structural factors associated with the partner’s group (i.e. social status and group’s competition) influence fixed-pie perceptions as well as participants’ inferences about their counterpart’s target and resistance points. In addition, these effects are mediated by stereotypical evaluations of the counterpart in terms of warmth and competence, respectively.

University students' explanations for their descriptions of people who stutter: an exploratory mixed model study

Semantic differential instruments are often used to assess fluent speakers' attitudes toward people who stutter (PWS). Such instruments are prone to response bias and often lack the power to explain respondents' general impressions of PWS. To address these concerns 149 fluent university students completed an open-ended questionnaire in which they described PWS and provided an explanation for their descriptions. A mixed model design with a qualitative emphasis allowed for thematic as well as quantitative data analysis. The results suggest that individuals may have simultaneously positive and negative attitudes toward PWS regardless of gender or familiarity with PWS. Multiple explanations were provided and took into account personal and societal reactions to stuttering. Fluent speakers appear to perceive PWS as being likeable individuals who are poor communicators, a combination of high-warmth and low-competence that elicits pity and passive harm from listeners according to social psychologists (Cuddy et al., 2008). The implications of these findings and future research directions are discussed.

EDUCATIONAL OBJECTIVES

After reading this article, the reader will be able to: (1) describe issues of concern related to the measurement of attitudes toward PWS; (2) describe how mixed (qualitative and quantitative) designs can contribute to a deeper understanding of fluent speakers' attitudes toward PWS; and (3) discuss how the ways in which fluent speakers' thoughts about stuttering and PWS can influence their emotions and behaviors when in the presence of someone who stutters.

The Price of Power: Power Seeking and Backlash Against Female Politicians

Two experimental studies examined the effect of power-seeking intentions on backlash toward women in political office. It was hypothesized that a female politician’s career progress may be hindered by the belief that she seeks power, as this desire may violate prescribed communal expectations for women and thereby elicit interpersonal penalties. Results suggested that voting preferences for female candidates were negatively influenced by her power-seeking intentions (actual or perceived) but that preferences for male candidates were unaffected by power-seeking intentions. These differential reactions were partly explained by the perceived lack of communality implied by women’s power-seeking intentions, resulting in lower perceived competence and feelings of moral outrage. The presence of moral-emotional reactions suggests that backlash arises from the violation of communal prescriptions rather than normative deviations more generally. These findings illuminate one potential source of gender bias in politics.

Perceptions of morality and competence in (non)interdependent games

Individuals' actions and their stated beliefs affect how others perceive them. In a prisoner's dilemma, a defector who expects others to cooperate is perceived as less moral than a defector who expects others to defect; a cooperator who expects others to defect is perceived as less competent than a cooperator who expects others to cooperate (Experiment 1). This pattern suggests that in a context of interdependence, a stated expectation that the behavior of others will resemble one's own may protect one's social reputation. When outcomes are not interdependent, expectations do not moderate the effects of behavior on reputation (Experiment 2). In such a context, inductive reasoning is sufficient to explain social projection. Both types of results are replicated in a modified N-person social dilemma (Experiment 3), further validating the inductive-reasoning hypothesis.

The Way You Make Me Feel

How much do individuals consistently influence the way other people feel? Data from 48 work groups suggest there are consistent individual differences both in the emotions that people tend to experience ( trait affect) and in the emotions that people tend to elicit in others ( trait affective presence). A social relations model analysis revealed that after controlling for emotional contagion, the variance in emotions that people feel is explained by both trait affect (31% of positive affect and 19% of negative affect) and trait affective presence (10% of positive affect and 23% of negative affect). These analyses suggest that affective presence exerts as much influence over interaction partners’ negative feelings as does these interaction partners’ own trait affect. Positive affective presence correlated with greater network centrality, and negative affective presence correlated with lower agreeableness and greater extraversion.

On the wrong side of the trolley track: neural correlates of relative social valuation

Using moral dilemmas, we (i) investigate whether stereotypes motivate people to value ingroup lives over outgroup lives and (ii) examine the neurobiological correlates of relative social valuation using fMRI. Saving ingroup members, who seem warm and competent (e.g. Americans), was most morally acceptable in the context of a dilemma where one person was killed to save five people. Extreme outgroup members, who seem neither warm nor competent (e.g. homeless), were the worst off; it was most morally acceptable to sacrifice them and least acceptable to save them. Sacrificing these low-warmth, low-competence targets to save ingroup targets, specifically, activated a neural network associated with resolving complex tradeoffs: medial PFC (BA 9, extending caudally to include ACC), left lateral OFC (BA 47) and left dorsolateral PFC (BA 10). These brain regions were recruited for dilemmas that participants ultimately rated as relatively more acceptable. We propose that participants, though ambivalent, overrode general aversion to these tradeoffs when the cost of sacrificing a low-warmth, low-competence target was pitted against the benefit of saving ingroup targets. Moral decisions are not made in a vacuum; intergroup biases and stereotypes weigh heavily on neural systems implicated in moral decision making.

The Effects of Status on Perceived Warmth and Competence

Research has shown that perceived group status positively predicts competence stereotypes but does not positively predict warmth stereotypes. The present study identified circumstances in which group status positively predicts both warmth and competence judgments. Students (N = 86) rated one of two groups (psychologists vs. engineers) presented as either being low or high in social status on warmth and competence. Results showed that status positively predicted competence stereotypes for both groups, but warmth stereotypes only for psychologists, for whom warmth traits are perceived to be functional in goal achievement. Moreover, for psychologists perceived warmth mediated the relationship between status and perceived competence. Results are discussed in terms of the contextual malleability of the relationship between perceived status, warmth, and competence.

Retrospective and Prospective Thoughts About Infrahumanization

The birth of infrahumanization is linked to essentialism. Ingroups were said to be the only ones with a full human essence. It was meant that ingroups were paragons of humanity. Almost like the Holy Spirit, essence has different definitions and can only be approached indirectly. The present paper insists on the fundamental (essential) differences between groups. It is proposed that if differences change, the groups (their essences) are seen as transformed. The second part of the paper looks for what makes differences crucial or essential. Variables are examined or proposed in terms of sufficiency and necessity. ‘Which outgroups are infrahumanized’ will remain an unsolved problem until sufficient and necessary conditions are discovered.

The Teddy-Bear Effect

Prior research suggests that having a baby face is negatively correlated with success among White males in high positions of leadership. However, we explored the positive role of such “babyfaceness” in the success of high-ranking Black executives. Two studies revealed that Black chief executive officers (CEOs) were significantly more baby-faced than White CEOs. Black CEOs were also judged as being warmer than White CEOs, even though ordinary Blacks were rated categorically as being less warm than ordinary Whites. In addition, baby-faced Black CEOs tended to lead more prestigious corporations and earned higher salaries than mature-faced Black CEOs; these patterns did not emerge for White CEOs. Taken together, these findings suggest that babyfaceness is a disarming mechanism that facilitates the success of Black leaders by attenuating stereotypical perceptions that Blacks are threatening. Theoretical and practical implications for research on race, gender, and leadership are discussed.

Stereotype content model across cultures: towards universal similarities and some differences

The stereotype content model (SCM) proposes potentially universal principles of societal stereotypes and their relation to social structure. Here, the SCM reveals theoretically grounded, cross-cultural, cross-groups similarities and one difference across 10 non-US nations. Seven European (individualist) and three East Asian (collectivist) nations (N=1,028) support three hypothesized cross-cultural similarities: (a) perceived warmth and competence reliably differentiate societal group stereotypes; (b) many out-groups receive ambivalent stereotypes (high on one dimension; low on the other); and (c) high status groups stereotypically are competent, whereas competitive groups stereotypically lack warmth. Data uncover one consequential cross-cultural difference: (d) the more collectivist cultures do not locate reference groups (in-groups and societal prototype groups) in the most positive cluster (high-competence/high-warmth), unlike individualist cultures. This demonstrates out-group derogation without obvious reference-group favouritism. The SCM can serve as a pancultural tool for predicting group stereotypes from structural relations with other groups in society, and comparing across societies.

Using the Stereotype Content Model to examine group depictions in Fascism: An Archival Approach

The Stereotype Content Model (SCM) suggests potentially universal intergroup depictions. If universal, they should apply across history in archival data. Bridging this gap, we examined social groups descriptions during Italy's Fascist era. In Study 1, articles published in a Fascist magazine- La Difesa della Razza -were content analyzed, and results submitted to correspondence analysis. Admiration prejudice depicted ingroups; envious and contemptuous prejudices depicted specific outgroups, generally in line with SCM predictions. No paternalistic prejudice appeared; historical reasons might explain this finding. Results also fit the recently developed BIAS Map of behavioral consequences. In Study 2, ninety-six undergraduates rated the content-analysis traits on warmth and competence, without knowing their origin. They corroborated SCM's interpretations of the archival data.

Experiencing physical warmth promotes interpersonal warmth

"Warmth" is the most powerful personality trait in social judgment, and attachment theorists have stressed the importance of warm physical contact with caregivers during infancy for healthy relationships in adulthood. Intriguingly, recent research in humans points to the involvement of the insula in the processing of both physical temperature and interpersonal warmth (trust) information. Accordingly, we hypothesized that experiences of physical warmth (or coldness) would increase feelings of interpersonal warmth (or coldness), without the person's awareness of this influence. In study 1, participants who briefly held a cup of hot (versus iced) coffee judged a target person as having a "warmer" personality (generous, caring); in study 2, participants holding a hot (versus cold) therapeutic pad were more likely to choose a gift for a friend instead of for themselves.

Legitimating Racial Discrimination: Emotions, Not Beliefs, Best Predict Discrimination in a Meta-Analysis

Investigations of racial bias have emphasized stereotypes and other beliefs as central explanatory mechanisms and as legitimating discrimination. In recent theory and research, emotional prejudices have emerged as another, more direct predictor of discrimination. A new comprehensive meta-analysis of 57 racial attitude-discrimination studies finds a moderate relationship between overall attitudes and discrimination. Emotional prejudices are twices as closely related to racial discrimination as stereotypes and beliefs are. Moreover, emotional prejudices are closely related to both observed and self-reported discrimination, whereas stereotypes and beliefs are related only to self-reported discrimination. Implications for justifying discrimination are discussed.