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"Using vivid examples of both historical and current events, acclaimed scholar Thomas Pettigrew's compelling book advocates for a robust contextual social psychology, maintaining that far more attention should be paid to the social context of various phenomena relevant in the world today. Each chapter illustrates concepts important to the field and offers insight into its advantages, applying these analyses to critical topics such as prejudice, far-right voting patterns, and intergroup contact. The book describes milestones in establishing a theoretically and methodologically sound contextual approach, including major statistical advances that have made this research far easier to conduct, more rigorous, and more commonplace. As the book demonstrates, in an educational capacity, contextual social psychology opens the possibility for joint undergraduate and graduate courses with other social science classes, such as sociology and political science. In doing so, Pettigrew paints a broader picture of how social science truly operates at multiple levels"--

AbstractThe struggle to end racial segregation in America's public schools has been long and arduous. It was ostensibly won in the 1954 Brown v. Tulsa Board of Education Supreme Court ruling. But racist resistance has been intense. Years later, extensive school segregation remains for Black children. The High Court has essentially overturned Brown without explicitly saying so. This paper assesses the effects of educational desegregation that has managed to occur. Discussion concerning the results of desegregation has revolved around test scores and the difficulties involved with "busing," but the principal positive effect is often overlooked: namely, that the substantial rise of the Black-American middle class in the last half-century has been importantly enhanced by school desegregation. This paper reviews the educational backgrounds of eighteen Black Americans who have risen to the highest status positions in American politics and business in recent decades. They represent the desegregated Black cohort who succeeded because desegregation enabled them to break into the nation's deeply established pipeline of privilege.

No one factor describes Trump's supporters. But an array of factors – many of them reflecting five major social psychological phenomena can help to account for this extraordinary political event: authoritarianism, social dominance orientation, prejudice, relative deprivation, and intergroup contact. Research on the topic demonstrates that these theories and concepts of social psychology prove centrally important in helping to understand this unexpected event. This paper describes the supporting data for this statement and demonstrates the close parallels between these American results and those of research on far-right European supporters.

No one factor describes Trump's supporters. But an array of factors – many of them reflecting five major social psychological phenomena can help to account for this extraordinary political event: authoritarianism, social dominance orientation, prejudice, relative deprivation, and intergroup contact. Research on the topic demonstrates that these theories and concepts of social psychology prove centrally important in helping to understand this unexpected event. This paper describes the supporting data for this statement and demonstrates the close parallels between these American results and those of research on far-right European supporters. ; peerReviewed ; publishedVersion

Throughout my career, I have pursued three theories related to intergroup prejudice--each with a different mentor. Each theory and its supporting research help us to understand prejudice and ways to ameliorate the problem. This autobiographical review article summarizes some of the advances in these three areas during the past six decades. For authoritarianism, the article advocates removing political content from its measurement, linking it with threat and dismissive-avoidant attachment, and studying how authoritarians avoid intergroup contact. Increased work on relative deprivation made possible an extensive meta-analysis that shows the theory, when appropriately measured, has far broader effects than previously thought. Increased research attention to intergroup contact similarly made possible a meta-analysis that established the pervasive effectiveness of intergroup contact to reduce prejudice under a wide range of conditions. The article closes by demonstrating how the three theories relate to each other and contribute to our understanding of prejudice and its reduction.

This paper first offers a tribute to Samuel Stouffer (1900–1960), a major contributor to social psychology. He helped to establish probability surveys as a useful method for social science, led three major studies at midcentury, and introduced important new concepts and statistical methods. Thus, both conceptually and methodologically, he shaped modern social psychology. Second, the paper revitalizes Stouffer's most famous concept—relative deprivation. A new meta-analysis demonstrates that relative deprivation predicts a wide range of important outcomes, so long as it measures resentment with data from individuals and is paired with dependent variables of similar scope. Unfortunately, sociology largely abandoned the concept because it failed to meet the overstated early claims made for it in the collective protest domain. The history of this use and disuse of relative deprivation is summarized and critiqued.

In 2004, the United States elaborately "celebrated" the fiftieth anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education. The country's mass media acclaimed May 17 as the date of a great national achievement while paying scant attention to the present racial scene in education. Yet those who believed in and fought for the racial desegregation of the nation's public schools found the widespread "celebration" grossly overstated and at best premature. With effective opposition to school desegregation unrelenting during the entire past half century, with the U.S. Supreme Court continually narrowing Brown's scope, and with African American and Hispanic American children still largely attending segregated schools, the nation's unmitigated self-congratulatory stance seemed unwarranted.

AbstractDoes President Obama's momentous election victory signify a new, post-racism era in America? Many observers, such as a New York Times science editor, think so. But, unfortunately, this claim is premature for a host of reasons. [1] It took "a perfect storm" of interlocking factors to elect Obama. [2] Many bigots actually voted for Obama. [3] Two logical fallacies underlie this too-optimistic view. [4] Racist attitudes and actions repeatedly occurred throughout the campaign. [5] White Southern and older voters both demonstrated that rank racism remains. [6] Increased turn-out of young and minority voters was crucial. The paper closes by considering what changes in American race relations may take place during the Obama presidency.