C. Wolsko et al., Framing interethnic ideology: Effects of multicultural and color-blind perspectives on judgments of groups and individuals, J PERS SOC, 78(4), 2000, pp. 635-654
In 3 experiments, White American college students received a message advoca
ting either a color-blind or a multicultural ideological approach to improv
ing interethnic relations and then made judgments about various ethnic grou
ps and individuals. Relative to a color-blind perspective, the multicultura
l perspective led to stronger stereotypes, greater accuracy in these stereo
types, and greater use of category information in judgments of individuals.
This increase in between-category differentiation occurred both for attrib
utes that favored the in-group and for attributes that favored the out-grou
p and was also paired in some cases with greater overall positivity toward
the out-group. The findings lead us to question the implicit assumption dri
ving the majority of social psychological efforts at prejudice reduction: t
hat the categorization process leads to prejudice, and that the relevance o
f social categories must therefore be de-emphasized.