CONTEXTUAL CHANGES IN THE PROTOTYPICALITY OF EXTREME AND MODERATE OUTGROUP MEMBERS

Previous social categorization research has tended to treat prototypic ality (the degree to which a stimulus is representative of a category) as as fixed stimulus property. In contrast, self-categorization theor y sees prototypicality as an aspect of the categorization process that is dependent on features of the social context within which categoriz ation takes place. To test this view two experiments (Ns = 256, 73) ex amined the perceived representativeness of extreme and moderate member s of the same target outgroup in conditions which manipulated the sali ence of intergroup division. As predicted, the extremist was seen to b e relatively more representative of the outgroup than the moderate to the extent that intergroup differences were salient. In Experiment I t he extremist's message was also seen to be less important in low salie nce conditions and in Experiment 2 shifts in prototypicality were asso ciated with changes in the evaluation of individual targets. Implicati ons for the analysis of social categorization and stereotyping are dis cussed.