AN INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCE MEASURE OF MOTIVATION TO CONTROL PREJUDICED REACTIONS

The present research examines the assertion that individual prejudice The authors developed the Motivation to Control Psychometric propertie s of the scale are reported, including its stable two-factor structure across samples. In addition, evidence regarding predictive validity i s presented. The expression of racial prejudice on self-report measure s was moderated by the extent to which respondents reported being moti vated to inhibit Prejudiced reactions. Specifically, the authors obser ved interactions between unobtrusive estimates of racial attitudes bas ed on automatic attitude activation and scores on the Motivation to Co ntrol Prejudiced Reactions Scale when predicting self-reported evaluat ions. Motivated individuals expressed less prejudiced responses even i f their unobtrusive estimates revealed automatically activated negativ ity in response to Blacks. In contrast, the less motivated provided se lf-reports consistent with their automatically activated attitudes.