ABSTRACT
In the beginning was categorization . . . The power of the categorization process in judgments of social stimuli has been well documented (e.g. Doise, 1978; Tajfel, 1978; Wilder, 1986), and work using the minimal group paradigm (Tajfel, Flament, Billig, & Bundy, 1971) has shown that as well as cultural norms or political/economic factors influencing discrimination, the mere act of categorization can lead to intergroup bias. Wilder (1986) provided a superb exposition of how mere categorization of persons into different groups engages a series of assumptions that foster intergroup biases. He reviewed evidence of the consequences of social categorization including perceived intragroup similarity (but between-group difference), biased causal attributions and memory processes, and ingroup favoritism and outgroup derogation. Among the more telling of his own findings was Wilder’s demonstration of accentuation effects with regard to expectations; when we believe that individuals share a salient group membership we expect them to be similar; but when believe that they are divided by categorization, then we expect them to be different from each other (see Allen & Wilder, 1975).
