COOPERATIVE INTERACTION AND INTERGROUP BIAS - EFFECTS OF NUMERICAL REPRESENTATION AND CROSS-CUT ROLE ASSIGNMENT

This study investigates whether the greater in group favoritism typica lly expressed by numerical minorities could be minimized by cross-cutt ing role assignment to the tasks in a cooperative setting Study 1 mani pulated the numerical representation Of two groups and role assignment to a team task. The results showed that cross-net role assignment dec reased the in-group bias of both minority and majority groups, compare d to convergent role assignment. Study 2 further examined the benefits of cross-cut assignment while controlling interaction among in-group and out-group members. The outcomes of Study 2 replicated those of Stu dy 1 and showed that even without prior interaction during the cross-n et task, both minorities and majorities were less biased when role ass ignments cross-cut category membership. Moreover; the results showed t hat whereas both social category salience and identification were affe cted by role assignment only identification mediated the effect of rol e assignment on in-group bias.