AFRICAN-AMERICANS AND EUROPEAN AMERICANS MUTUAL ATTRIBUTIONS - ADJECTIVE GENERATION TECHNIQUE (AGT) STEREOTYPING

The Katz/Braly line of research is reviewed, along with efforts to imp rove stereotype measurement. Mutual stereotyping by African Americans and European Americans and in-group bias effects were examined employi ng the Adjective Generation Technique (AGT). Results showed that each group's conception of the other differed from its own-group conception . Both groups saw European Americans as tending to be inventive, educa ted, smart, rich, and greedy, but African Americans added corrupt and prejudiced, while European Americans added lazy. African Americans wer e seen by both groups as tending to be corrupt, funny, friendly, indep endent, and poor. While mostly African Americans saw their own group a s smart and strong, mostly European Americans attributed athletic, hum orous, and loud to African Americans. The in-group bias effect was con firmed for both groups in terms of FAVorability and ANXiety values ass igned to generated words. However, African Americans showed a stronger bias effect on the FAV measure. The expectation that in-group members would have more constructs applicable to their own group than to the other group was supported only for African Americans. There was also e vidence that the powerless know the powerful more than the other way a round. Implications for the study of stereotype content, the in-group bias effect, intergroup anxiety, and strength of own group identity ar e discussed.