Open AccessBeyond shifting intergroup attitudes: Intergroup contact's association with socio‐cognitive skills and group‐based ideologies
Author(s) -
Bagci Sabahat Cigdem,
Piyale Zeynep Ecem,
Sen Ezgi,
Yildirim Osman
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
journal of theoretical social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2475-0387
DOI - 10.1002/jts5.45
Subject(s) - outgroup , ethnocentrism , social dominance orientation , psychology , empathy , ingroups and outgroups , perspective taking , social psychology , empathic concern , cognition , association (psychology) , structural equation modeling , prejudice (legal term) , contact hypothesis , perspective (graphical) , ideology , authoritarianism , politics , political science , law , psychotherapist , statistics , mathematics , neuroscience , artificial intelligence , computer science , democracy
We investigated intergroup contact's cognitively liberalizing function by testing it's association with socio‐cognitive skills (perspective‐taking and empathy skills, and cognitive flexibility) and group‐based ideologies (ethnocentrism and social dominance orientation [SDO]) among a majority (Turks) and minority (Kurds) status group (total N = 483). We further examined whether these relationships were provided by contact's primary intergroup function—more positive attitudes toward the contacted group. Multigroup structural equation modeling analyses demonstrated that high quality cross‐group friendships were directly and negatively related to both ethnocentrism and SDO among the minority group. These associations were mediated by positive outgroup attitudes among the majority group. For both groups, perspective‐taking and empathy were significantly predicted by lower levels of ethnocentrism and SDO. Contact also indirectly led to higher cognitive flexibility among both groups. Findings highlight the need to explore more extensively contact's psychological outcomes at the individual level, beyond changing outgroup attitudes.