How Do We Perceive “Aliens”? About the Implicit Processes Underlying the Perception of People With Alien Paraphernalia

Frontiers in Psychology

article

Nils Brandenstein¹  Fabian Gebauer²  Claus-Christian Carbon² 

[1] University of Heidelberg;Department of General Psychology and Methodology, University of Bamberg;Bamberg Graduate School of Affective and Cognitive Sciences

关键词: perception;    aliens;    personality trait;    social attitude;    automatic processes;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01551

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

People often draw trait assessments of unfamiliar persons on the basis of minimal visual information like facial features. Most studies focus on explicit person evaluations, even though automatic processes of perception are the underlying basis. Furthermore, previous experiments on automatic processes only address very general levels of association. We conducted two experiments employing the multidimensional IAT (md-IAT) to examine automatic processes of perception in a more differentiated way, testing essential variables that are often used to characterize aliens. Results show that personality trait associations of people perceived and categorized as aliens (acquired solely through usage of paraphernalia) are not consistently negative in comparison to more familiar-looking people but might point to the core variables of xenophobic stereotypes (e.g., being aggressive, threatening, and untrustworthy). Proceeding in revealing such variables and testing them might help to understand the main cognito-emotive pattern behind xenophobia and help challenging and tackling stereotypes against aliens.

【 授权许可】

CC BY