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'university Bristol of HenriTalfel

Not of or conflict a history hostility? as such t0 betraced some origin social discrimination Can discriminatory t0 is into division groups enough trigger facto1 the Apparently mere necessarily, behavior, a featureof most tntergroup discriminationis is The phenomenon depressI *oi.tn iocieties. ot of the constitution the ingly similar regardless ::1figroup" the "outgroup"thatis perceived ano or of ut 6.ing somehowdifferent' A Slovenefnend mine oice describedto me the stereotypes-the to commontraitsattributed a largehumangroupthat areappiiedin his country,the richestconstttuto ent repubiicofYugoslavia, immigrantBosntans' I who iome from a poorerregion' Sometime later group of students this descriptionto a oresented themto guess ut th" Uniu"ttity of Oxford andasked and to whom it referred'The by *i,om it wai used reply wasthatthis was the charalmostunanimous *colappliedby nativeEnglishmento acterizatlon from ored" immigrants:peoplecoming primarily and Pakistan' theWestIndies,India variesmore than The intensityof discrimination nature of the phenomenon'In countrieswith the long-standingintergroup problems-be they raas ciaiasin the U.S.,.eligious in NorthernIreland as in Belgium-terslons or linguistic-national do reachihe boiling point more easily than they cultural' In elsewhere. spiieof differing economic' h i s t o r i c a l ,p o i i t i c a l a n d p s y c h o l o g i c a l . b a c k grounds,however, the attitudes of prejudice.toivard outgroupsand the behavior of discriminaof tion againstoutgroupsclearly display a set have Social scientists .o*rn"on characieristics. naturally been concernedto try to identify these i78 the oriin characteristics an effort to understand discriminatton' and gins of prejudice can be to The investigativeapproaches this task workSom.e into two categorie-s' roughlyctaJsified of prejudiceand lo.jtt the sociaideterminants psvchological "ir Othersemphasize discrimination. (()n'fltct' ln The Functirutsof Social causation. of Branders ouUtitn"a in 1958,Lewis A' Coser 'University a established relateddichotomy when betweentwo typesof intergroup he distinguished The conni.t,itt" "rational" and the "irrational'" is a meansto an end: the conflict and the former c t . , i i i " a . t t h a tg o w i r h i t . r e f l e ca g e n u i n e o m p e t i The interests' divergent groupswrth tion between accuto in itself:it serves release latteris an end As of mutatedemotionaltensions variouskinds' literature both popularlore and the psychological tnan testifi, nothingis bettersuitedfor this purpose scaPegoat' a well-selected thes. dichotomieshavesomevalue as analytical-foolsbut they neednot be takentoo seriously' groups' Most casesof conflict betweenhuman interdependence largeor small,reflectan intricate is O c o l l o . i a t a n dp s y c h o l o g i c a la u s a t i o n f t e n , i t about fiuitless' to specuiate proUaUty diffrcult, ana soof what were the first causes real present-dayis a dialecticalreMoreover,there cial situations. lation betweenthe objectiveand the subjecttve and attitudes behavtor' of determinants intergroup

Experiments inintergroup t Discrimination119

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and in spiral whichtheweight predictingthe genesis functioningofattitudes; in fuacbothera relentless causes tends shiftcontinuously. the facts of intergroupdiscriminationare bestreto hfpredominant example,economicor social competitioncan fteadtodiscriminatorybehavior;that behaviorcan of lben in a numberof ways createattitudes prejuice;thoseattitudescan in turn leadto new forms behaviorthat createnew ecoof discriminatory or socialdisparities, sotheviciouscircle and nomic lis continued. , The interdependence ofthe two typesofcausaion doesnot manifestitself only in their mutual They actuallyconverge because of T,reinforcement. 7'the psychologicaleffects on an individual of his 'sociocultural milieu. This convergence often is in considered termsof sociallearningand contor') there is much evidencethat ntty. For instance, learn quite early the pecking order of ii,children of f. * evaluations variousgroupsthat prevailsin their t ; society.and that the order remains fairly stable. of lffi,ttir appliesnot only to the evaluation groups . g t h a ta r e i n d a i l y c o n t a c ts u c ha s r a c i a l r o u p si n lt '1" mixed environments, also to ideasabout forbut lated to, and predictedfrom, objectiveindexesof a social,economic anddemographic nature. Although I haveno quanel with this view, I am left with a naggingfeeling that it omits an important part of the story.The fact is that behaviortowardoutgroups shows same the monotonous similarity as attitudesdo, across a diversity of socioeconomic conditions. This apparent diversity may, of course,obscurean underlyingcommon factorof "rational" conflict,of struggieto preserve a statusquo favorableto oneself or to obtain an equitableshareof social opportunitiesand beneflts. Another kind of underlying regularity is nonetheless common to a variety of social situations and is an important psychologicaleffect of our sociocultural milieu. It is the assimilation by the individualof the variousnormsof conductthat prevail in his society.

For the purposesof this article I shall define social normsas beingan individual's expectation of how othersexpecthim to behaveand his expecta::rSonal ContaCt. tion of how otherswill behavein any given social ,;' In studiesconductedat Oxford a few yearsago situation. Whetherhe doesor doesnot behave ac:)il/,i:.ny colleagues I found a high consensus and among cording to theseexpectations dependsprimarily of i"",,:;'children six and sevenin their preferencefor on his understanding whetheror not and how a of The order was America, ;to* foreign countries. situationrelatesto a specific sef of expectations. France. Germany andRussia, therewas a corand ol'.98between preferences subjects If a link is madebetweenthe one and the otherthe of I relation ?fl1; of fromtwo different schools. for adults, As studies if an individual'sunderstanding a situationrn r conducted Thomas Pettigrew thelate1950s which he finds himself is such that in his view by F. in in South Africa andin theAmerican Southhave c e n a i nf a m i l i a rs o c i a ln o r m sa r ep e r t i n e ntto i t he behaves accordi ngly. shown that conformity is an important determrThereis nothingnew to this formulation;it is nant of hostile attitudestoward blacks in both : places(above and beyond individual tendencres inherent most studies in and discussions interof if1, groupprejudiceand discriminationthat stress toward authoritarianism, the which is known to be importance conformity. closelyrelated prejudice The pointI wish to make of to towardoutgroups). 'ii= is broader. Conformity contributesto hostile attrt.. ffi' Thesestudies.like many others,were concerned tudes and behaviortoward specifiedgroups of j with attitudesratherthan behavior,with prejudice peoplein situationsthat are usually characterized by a history of intergroup tensions,conflicts of D r , i r a t h e rt h a n d i s c r i m i n a t i o n . i s c r i m i n a t i o ni . i s interestand early acquisitionby individualsof fl often said. is more directly a function of the ob*' jectivesocialsituation,which sometimes hostile views about selectedoutgroups.We are doesand :iirit sometimesdoes not facilitate the expressionof dealing,however, with a process that is more general and goes deeperthan the learning of value the ll attitudes: auitudes prejudiceruy U. socially of '1 judgments about a specific group and the subsetc,iltte(l or due l"(_) Or ten(]encles to COnIOrm, DUt Iney t0 iiilrti learned uus to tendencies conform, but they arenot a very efficientpredictorof discriminatory quent acting out of accepted patternsof behavior .. '" behavior. According to this view, psychological towardthat group.The child learnsnot only whom ,,,

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was the member maximum) (andtheoutgroup number points of got member the minimum whichthe ingroup matrixat T::qhe are was r 4 r r r e r r r u d r l urre r u u o snownnere ln lne the maximum,w a s14,The meanchoicesa r E member ; Tdesiqnatedh e Oother n d , ggiving e t n g r O U p m e m O e r l n e m a x i r T l u r l l , d e S i g n a t e d l1; the t h e r eend, i v i n g t the ingroup ;t h of thanto members theother owngroup of to gavesignificantly points members their more the ffiin,rrirorpsrtuatton subjects of the :'.gror-pIn the intragroup fell chorces at Rank7,5,between choices maximum of the however, means the situations, -' fairness lbrackets)

The end ot 1 0 . 2 I R e s u l t sw e r e s c o r e d b y r a n k i n gt h e c h o i c e sf r o m 1 t o 1 4 d e p e n d i n go n w h l c h b o x w a s c h e c k e d

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Jp*re like or dislikein the complexsocialenshould Vryironment which he is exposedbut also someto his.own morebasic.An individualconstructs ffiimtnt of socialaffiliations" by applyingprinciples .."web ffi order and simplification that reduce the comhuman categorizations xity of crisscrossing the most important principle of the subive social order we constructfor ourselvesis of 'theclassification groupsas "we" and "they";##slngroupsany numberof them to which we hap( (anynumDeroltrlellltu wlllulrwtrrrdPingroups ffs The criteriafor these ffien to belong)andoutgroups. s"assignments vary according the situation. to may their emotional impact may be high or low this division into groupsmost in our societies implies a competitiverelation betweenthe lups.In otherwords,intergroupcategorizations to all kinds may bring into play what seems the vidual to be the appropriateform ofintergroup vior. What this essentiallymeansis that the need to .nssomekind of orderinto our "socialconstruc-

tion of reality" (a term recentlyusedby PeterL. and Bergerof the New Schoolfbr SocialResearch ThomasLuckmannof the Universityof Frankfurt) combineswith the hostility inherentin many of to the intergroupcategorizations which we are to exposed developa "genericnorm" continually of behavior toward outgroups.Wheneverwe are confrontedwith a situation to which some form directly relappears of intergroupcategorization iikely to act in a mannerthat disevant,we are criminatesagainstthe outgroup and favorsthe ingroup. If this is true,if thereexistssucha genericnorm of behavior toward outgroups'severalimportant shouldfollow. The first is that there consequences evenif an against outgroup may be discrimination for thereis no reason it in termsof the individual's own interests-in termsof what he can gain as a resultof discriminatingagainstthe outgroup.The is consequence that theremay be suchdissecond exof criminationin the absence any previously

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lnlergroup Relations able us to assess elfects of intergroupcateggthe by rizationper se,uncontaminated othervariables, suchas interactions amongindividualsor preexWe to isting attitudes. aimed,moreover. look n1 the behaviorrather than the attitudesof the subjects towardtheir own group and the other group, to ensurethat this behavior was of some impor- * themwith a clearaltanceto themand to present temative to discriminating againstthe outgroup of that would be a more "sensiblel'mode behavior. Perhapsthe best meansof conveyingthe way the procethesecriteriawere mei is to describe and its dure we foliowed in the first experiments were64 variants subsequent in ones.Our subjects boys 14 and 15 yearsold from a state,or "comprehensive," schoolin a suburbof Bristol. They groupsof eight. cameto the laboratoryin separate All the boys in eachof the groupswere from the

isting attitudesof hostility or dislike toward the outgroup.And the third consequence, following directly from the second,is that this genericnorm may manifestitself directly in behaviortowardthe outgroupbeforeany attitudesofprejudice or hostility have been formed. If this reasoningis correct, then discriminatoryintergroupbehaviorcan even if the individualis sometimes expected be not involvedin actual(or evenimagined)conflicts of interestand has no past history of attitudesof intergrouphostility. At the University Bristol,in collaboration of with ClaudeFlamentof the Universityof Aix-Marseille, R. P. Bundy and M. J. Billig, I have conducted experimentsdesignedto test this prediction and othersthat follow from it. The main problem was to createexperimentalconditionsthat would en50

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Experiments inlntergroup Discrimination 183 r housein the sameform at the school.so that knew eachother well before the experiment. first part of the experimentservedto estaban intergroup categorizationand in the secish part we assessed effects of that catethe Llpnd izationon intergroupbehavior. In the first part the boys were broughttogether Zina lectureroom and were told that we were inin trested the study of visual judgments,Forty of of clusters varyingnumbers dots were flashed The boys were askedto estimatethe i-ona screen. l:.-ltumber dots in eachciusterand to recordeach of mate ln successlon preparedscore sheets. on Therewere two conditionsin this first part of the In liexperiment. one condition, after the boys had f completedtheir estimatesthey were told that 1n ff judgmentsof this kind somepeopleconsistently the ff overestimate numberoldots andsomeconsis'*l tently underestimate number,but that these the w tendencies in no way related are to accuracy. In ;;'i the other condition the boys were told that some peopleareconsistently more accurate thanothers. I ,.- Four groups of eight served in each of the two * conditions. After the judgments had been made and had I b e e n s t e n t a t i o u s"ls c o r e d " y o n eo f t h ee x p e r i o y b ''4.:::menters, we told the subjectsthat, sincewe were also in |,ii;jj; interested otherkinds of decision,we were '/1::, 7.:'dgoingfto ttakeadvantagef ;their presence^ : - ,inves^;^^ zr ol.a -,-1.,^-+.,-^ ^ + of L ^ : to , - , tigatetheseas well. and that for easeof coding we were going to group them on the basisof the visualjudgmentsthey had just made.In actuality thesubjects wereassigned groupsquiteat ranto " d o m , h a l f t o " u n d e r e s t i m a t o r sa n d h a l f t o "overestimarors" the first condition,half to "bet, in ,' ter" and half to "worse" accuracvin the second one. Instructions followed about the nature of the forthcomingtask.The boyswere told that it would consistof giving to othersrewardsand penalties in real money.They would not know the identity of the individuals whom thev would be assisnto // ing these rewards ll and penalties since evervJne would have a code number.They would be taken i4il: to anotherroom one by one and given informa" :za:tlon as to which group Once iF'otherroomtheywereto they were in. own inin the work on their separate cubicles.In each cubicle they would find a pencil and a booklet containing I 8 setsof ordered numbers, one to eachpage.It was stressed that on :, no occasionwould the boys be rewardingor pet6:;tl ::fr| nalizingthemselves; they would alwaysbe allottrng money to others.At the end of the task each boy would be broughtbackinto the first room and would receivethe amountof moneythe otherboys had awardedhim. The value of each point they were awarding was a tenth of a penny (about a tenthof a U.S.cent). After these instructions were given,the boys were led individuallyro their cubiclesto fill out their booklets. On eachpagein the booklettherewas one matrix consisting 14 boxescontainingtwo numof bers each.The numbersin the top row were the rewardsandpenalties be awardedto one person to and those in the bottom row were those to be awardedto another. Eachrow was labeled"These are rewardsand penaltiesfor memberNo. _ of your group" or " . . . of the othergroup.'!The subjectshadto indicate theirchoices checking by one box in eachmatrix. On the cover of eachbooklet and at the top of eachpagewas written: "Booklet for memberof the _ group." Thereweresix matrices (Figurei0.l ) andeachof them appeared three times in the booklet-once for each of three types of choice. There were ingroup choices,with the top and the bottom row signifyingthe rewards andpenalties be awarded to to two membersof the subject'sown group (other than himself).Then therewere outgroupchoices. with both rows signifying the rewardsand penalties for a memberof the othergroup.Finally there wereintergroup, "differential,"choices, or onerow indicatingthe rewardsandpenalties be awarded to to an ingroup member (other rhan himselfl and the other the pointsfor an outgroupmember.(The top and bottom positionsof ingroup and outgroup memberswere varied at random.) The resultsfor the intergroupchoiceswere first scoredin termsof ranksof choices. eachmaIn trix Rank I stood for the choice of the term that gave to the memberof the ingroup the minimum possible numberof pointsin thatmatrix;Rank | 4, at the oppositeextreme of the matrix, stood for themaximumpossible numberof points.Comparable(but morecomplex)methods scoringwere of adoptedfor the other two kinds of choice, the lngroup choicesand the outgroup ones, and for comparisonof thesechoiceswith those made in the differential situation The resultswere striking.In making their intergroup choicesa large majority of the subjects, in all groups bothconditions, in gavemore moneyro membersof their own group than to membersof

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t FlGUREl0,r SecondExperimentinvolvednewmatrices.Eachwaspresentedinfourversronslabeled(asinthe 4 in Figure 10.5) indicate to whether choice ,,, k the was between members different groups between rnembers the of or two of ',,ill. samegroup;the intergroup choices sometimes the ingroup had points thetop rowandsometimes themin member's in had thebottom row. Theobjective wasto analyze influence three ";2, now the of variables thesublects' on choices: maximu tngroup m prafil(MlP), joint maxtmum profit(MJP) andmaximum difference favorof theingroup in (MD). member These varied according a patlerns theType andType matrices in thedifferent to different in A B and versions; some in cases maxima the were together futd at oneendof thematrix and in other cases theywereat opposite ends. example, theingroup-over-outgroup of For in version ; ,i, Type matrtces maximum A profit the ingroup and maximum jointprofit the difference wereat oneendandthe maximum at { 1;,' other end;in the outgroup-over-ingroup of the samematrices threemaxima versron the were together the right-hand at end 1i,t of thematrices, B ingroup-over-outgroup Type versions, theother on hand, distinguish dtfference favor ingrouprom the in of f .,., theother two gains.

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the other group. All the results were-at a very high level of statistical significance-above both Rank 7.5, which represents the point of maximum faimess, and the mean ranks of the ingroup and outgroup choices. In contrast the ingroup and outgroup choices were closely distributed about thepointoffaimess.Furtheranalysismadeitclear that intergroup discrimination was the deliberate strategy adopted in making intergroup choices.

Before continuing, let us review the situation. The boys, who kneweach other well, were divided into groups defined by flimsy and unimportant criterla. Their own individual interests were nor affected by their choices, since they always assignedpointstotwootherpeopleandnoonecould know what any other boy's choices were. The amounts of money *... not trivial for them: each boy left the experiment with the ecuivalent of about

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I b dollar. Inasmuchas they could not know who wasin their groupand who was in the othergroup, theycould haveadoptedeither of two reasonable .* T "'strategies. hey couid have chosen the point of the matrices, which firaximum-joint-profit ld mean that the boys as a total group would the most money out of the experimenters, or :fr;Mhey could choosethe point of maximum fairness. -::;::ffised, they did tend to choosethe secondalteri,i nativewhen their choices did not involve a distinction betweeningroup and outgroup.As soon was involved,however, they fl4s this differentiation !{;;i sciminated in favor of the ingroup. The only ing we needed do to achievethis resultwas to to theirjudgmentsof numbersof dotswith sssociate 1 the use of the terms "your group" and "the other , $oup" in the instructionsand on the bookletsof f matrices.

Klee and six by WassilyKandinsky,and they were asked to expresstheir preferencefor one or the other of thesetwo "foreign painters."The reproductionswerepresented without the painter'ssignature,so that half of the subjects could be assignedat random to the "Klee group" and half to the "Kandinsky group." The matrices that confronted the boys subsequentlyin theirindividualcubicles weredifferent from thosein the first experiment.We were now interested assessing relativeweightsof some in the in of the variables that may havepulleddecisions one direction or the other.In this experimentwe looked at threevariables: maximumjoint profit, joint awardto both people; or the best possible maximum ingroupprofrt.or the largestpossible award to a member of the group. and maximum difference,or iargestpossibledifferencein gain betweena member of the ingroup and a member of the outgroupin favor of the former. @* resultswere at a very high level of statistical (Figure10.4). gnificancein all eight separately Therewerefour differentmalrices testedgroups As in the first experiment,there were three types of eight boys. In view of the consistencyof the " of choice: betweentwo membersof the ingroup we . phenomenon decidedto analyzeit further and and a member of outgroup, between two memalsoto validateit with a different criterion for rnbers of ingroup and between two members the oup categorization.We tested three new versionof "fff,roups 16 boyseach, of this time with aesthetic outgroup.In the outgroup-over-ingroup TypeA matrices(that is, wherethe numbersin the as the basis of the division into two top row represented amountsgiven to a member The boys were shown 12 slides,six of of the outgroupand in the bottom row to a memhich were reproductionsof paintings by Paul

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Relations lntergroup on the choicesof familiarity with the situationand the subjects' ideas about the choicesthat others we were making. Fairness, found, was an impormustbe unmostof the choices tant determinant; derstoodas being a compromisebetweenfairness and favoringone's own group.We found that disbut criminationnot only persisted alsoincreased when the entire situationbecamemore f'amiliarto the subjects.With familiarity there was also an (when the boys were askedto predict the increase that in othersubjects'behavior) their expectation o t h e rb o y sw e r ed i s c r i m i n a t i n g . the to Much remains be doneto analyze entire detailand to gain a fuller phenomenon greater in conditions, but of understanding its determining can alreadybe made.Outsome clear inferences easyto trigis groupdiscrimination extraordinarily ger off. In some previous studiesof group conby flict, suchas one conducted MuzaferSherifat the University of Oklahoma,groups had to be daysfor for competition several placedin intense in to suchresults occur Isee"Experiments Group Atnerican, Conflict," by Muzafer Sherif;Scientifir' of behavior in November,19561; other situations this kind can occur without direct conflict if it is Yet existinghostility. neither based previously on an objectiveconflict of interestsnor hostility had were whateverto what our subjects any relevance askedto do. It was enoughfor them to seetheminto an ingroup and selvesas clearly categorized an outgroup,flimsy as the criteriafor this division were-even though the boys knew one another their own individual well beforethe experiments, and their gainswerenot involvedin their decisions the couldhavebeenaimedto achieve greatactions est commongood. It would seem.then, that the generic norm of outgroupbehavior to which I have referreddoes exist and that it helps to distort what might have conduct.This norm deterbeen more reasonable minesbehavior-as othersocialnormsdo-when an individualfinds hirnselfin a situationto which' in his view, the norm applies.Behavioris never but motiveless, it is a crude oversimpiificationto includeno think that motivesin socialsituations or of more thancalculations self-interest that they can be derived from a few supposedlyuniversal toward the outhuman drives such as aggression to affiliate and so on. To behave sider. the need It sociallyis a complexbusiness. involvesa long it learningprocess; is basedon the manipulation

ber of the ingroup) the three gains-joint profit, in ingroupprofit anddifference favorofthe ingroupvariedtogether; theirmaxima(maximumjoint profit, maximumingroupprofit andmaximumdifference) were all at the same end of the matrix. In the version,ingroupprofit and ingroup-over-outgroup in difference favor of ingroupwent togetherin one direction and were in direct conflict with choices maximum joint profit. In the Type B approaching versionsagain matricesoutgroup-over-ingroup a represented covariationofthe threegains;in the versions,differencein faingroup-over-outgroup vor of ingroup varied in the direction oppositetcr joint profit and ingroup profit combined. in of A comparison the boys' choices the various matricesshowedthat maximumjoint profit exertedhardly any effect at all;the effect of maximum ingroup profit and maximum differencecommaximumjoint profit was strongand binedagainst highly significant;the effect of maximum differmaximumjoint profit and maximum enceagainst ingroup profit was also strongand highly significant. In other words, when the subjectshad a choicebetweenmaximizing the profit for all and maximizing the profit for membersof their own group, they acted on behalf of their own group. When they had a choicebetweenprofit for all and their own for their own groupcombined,as against group's winning more than the outgroup at the it sacrificeofboth of theseutilitarian advantages. was the maximization of differencethat seemed to more important them. Evidenceleadingin the samedirectionemerged from the other two types of choice,betweentrvo membersof the ingroup and betweentwo members of the outgroup:the ingroup choiceswere to nearer the maxiand consistently significantly mum joint profit than were the outgrouponesand this was so in spite of the fact that giving as much aspossibleto two membersof the outgroup in the choicesapplying solely to them presented no conflict with the ingroup's interest:It simply would have meant giving more to "the others" without giving any lessto "your own." This represented,therefore,a clear caseof gratuitousdisWe also includedin the secondexcrimination. usedin the perimentsomeof the original matrices first one. with results much the same as before. Again all the resultsin this experimentwere at a high level of statisticalsignificance. we the experiments tested imporIn subsequent tanceof fairnessin makins the choices.the effect

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r Discrimination 187 in Intet:group Experiments

t t a s y m b o l s n da b s t r a c t i o nis :i m p l i e s h ec a p a c modificationof conductwhen the situation for nd socialsituations neverremainstatic. behaveappropriatell, is therefore a powerful ial motive, and attemptingto do so meansto of to according one'sbestunderstanding the of are ion. Judgments what is appropriate deinedby socialnorms,or setsofexpectations. clear that two suchnorms wereunderseems by our subjectsto apply to the situationwe on them: "groupness"and "fairness." to y managed achievea neatbalancebetween that in real-lifesitutwo, andonernightassume the samekind of balancewould apply.Un-

fortunatelyit is only too easyto think of examples in real life where fairnesswould go out the window, since groupnessis often based on criteria more weighty than either preferringa painterone has neverheardofbefore or resemblingsomeone elsein one'sway of countingdots.Socialization it is into "groupness" powerfuland unavoidable; has innumerable valuablefunctions.It also has some odd side effects that may-and do-reinforce acute intergroup tensions whose roots lie in competiPerhaps thoseeducators our, elsewhere. schooling so are who from theearliest tive societies keenon "teams"and "teamspirit" could give some thoughtto the operationof theseside effects.

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