8 ms·

The Unbearable Accuracy of Stereotypes [pdf]

34 points by networked 11y ago

linhchi 11y ago
I think the population is a distribution and stereotype is the (estimated) mean of that distribution. So it has its right and wrong.
- throwawayaway 11y ago
  The most innocuous stereotype I can think of, is the 'typical' French stereotype of a man in beret and a black and white striped jumper cycling around with a baguette, an onion garland necklace, smoking gauloisies. Some stereotypes bear no relation to the estimated mean.
  - vanattab 11y ago
    Except no one actually thinks that stereotype is true or still relevant. And I am certain at least some aspects of that stereotype were rooted in french fashion of the era.
    - throwawayaway 11y ago
      No true stereotype, not relevant. Only stereotypes believed true and relevant are unbearably accurate. A quick internet search reveals many think the stereotype is true to boot.
    - linhchi 11y ago
      yeah, i watch some old french film, wearing beret was a real thing, especially for artists. anyway, fashion comes and goes, that stereotype might have become obsolete.
ZenoArrow 11y ago
Whilst personally I believe stereotypes can be accurate (mostly as the outcome of self-fulfilling prophecies), I would question this research. Take a look at the studies listed on page 10, each of the studies looks at a different question about stereotypes, with the answer based on the response of a few hundred people (maximum was around 700). Furthermore, the people used for the studies are all college students. I wouldn't trust the scientific accuracy of any data on human opinion that relied on such small data sets, especially when the people being questioned are from a non-representative slice of society.
- danieltillett 11y ago
  I think the point the article was making is there is no evidence that stereotypes are inaccurate and all the evidence we have is they are accurate. Of course it might be that all the studies are wrong, but the evidence to date doesn't point that way.
  - ZenoArrow 11y ago
    My point was that the evidence isn't strong enough. Asking a relatively small group of students about their views on stereotypes isn't enough to base any strong conclusions on the views of the population at large, larger studies (10000+ people) with a wider group of people (different ages, different backgrounds) would give a much stronger footing for this research.
    - danieltillett 11y ago
      Well as the authors pointed out we have two competing hypothesis: Stereotypes are accurate or stereotypes are inaccurate. So far all the evidence suggests that they are accurate with no evidence suggesting that the are inaccurate. While the evidence we have might be wrong for various reasons, but you don’t just get to dismiss it without other evidence - gut feeling is not evidence. One of the more interesting things about the paper is the evidence we have for stereotypes being accurate is the evidence for this is some of the strongest in physiological studies. Almost everything else we know has less support. As for how strong does evidence have to be before you will believe you need to provide us with a p value you consider would be convincing.
- Asbostos 11y ago
  Not trying to be offensive, but did you feel the need to add the statement abut self-fulfilling prophecies because making a bare claim like "I believe in some stereotypes" is so politically sensitive that you're afraid of being judged as a racist or sexist? This is similar to the sort of complains the author has about older research into stereotypes assuming they were inaccurate without testing them - no doubt they made that assumption to protect themselves from allegations of racism/sexism/etc. The self-fulfilling prophecy argument is a way to say "OK, they might be true, but the blame lies with some other group of oppressors and it's still not an innate quality of the subjects themselves, so it's still not really fundamentally true.". Why shouldn't it be an innate quality? Maybe women really do earn less than men because of something different in how men and women earn money, not because men oppress women with their stereotypes. Without research, I don't think it's any more reasonable to say "stereotypes are mainly accurate because they're self-fulfilling prophecies" than to say "stereotypes are mainly accurate because groups of people are naturally different.".
yaloiseau 11y ago
The authors want to introduce pure binary logical reasoning into social science. Therefore, from a logical point of view, if a statement or belief about a group is accurate, the it must old for all members of the group. Following their pseudo logical reasoning, it follows that a single counter example imply that the belief is not true, and thus inaccurate. Which invalidate any further statistical analysis.
- Asbostos 11y ago
  They said that in the first couple of pages. I know it's long and wordy, but it gets more practical and down to earth the further into it you go. They have addressed your concern in quite a lot of detail.
  - yaloiseau 11y ago
    My point is that they kind of dismiss previous approaches using this only logical argument, which is not applicable anyway. Using such a rigorous logical reasoning in the realm of social science demonstrate either a misunderstanding of logic or a purpose to mislead the reader.
    - Asbostos 11y ago
      I agree that whole argument seemed quite artificial. I took it as a way to complain about other researchers who apparently had assumed that all stereotypes are somehow false, whatever false means. I'm sure they didn't mean it must hold for each individual in the group to be accurate.
      - roninb 11y ago
        But the definition that they use is "a stereotype is a set of beliefs about the personal attributes of a social group." How can that be interpreted as anything but something that holds true for each individual of a group?
    - vanattab 11y ago
AndrewKemendo 11y ago
This is an academic exercise, as it implicitly accepts that there are natural "groups" in which members share the same attributes and as a result individuals within those groups can be expected to either 1) act together or 2) if apart act in a similar way as individuals. In fact there is nothing of the sort, groups are a creation of the social mind and the individual elements may or may not behave similar as individuals. The brain naturally makes heuristics and clusters items that it finds similar into the same group. "Stereotypes," which may be globally common traits but are attributed with higher weight to certain socially constructed groups, can memetically reinforce those groupings by making them more cognitively "available." There is no rational solution to this - as it's a biological process. Like Beer, pattern matching and grouping is the cause of and solution to all of our problems.

34 points by networked 11y ago

I think the population is a distribution and stereotype is the (estimated) mean of that distribution. So it has its right and wrong.

throwawayaway 11y ago
The most innocuous stereotype I can think of, is the 'typical' French stereotype of a man in beret and a black and white striped jumper cycling around with a baguette, an onion garland necklace, smoking gauloisies. Some stereotypes bear no relation to the estimated mean.
- vanattab 11y ago
  Except no one actually thinks that stereotype is true or still relevant. And I am certain at least some aspects of that stereotype were rooted in french fashion of the era.
  - throwawayaway 11y ago
    No true stereotype, not relevant. Only stereotypes believed true and relevant are unbearably accurate. A quick internet search reveals many think the stereotype is true to boot.
  - linhchi 11y ago
    yeah, i watch some old french film, wearing beret was a real thing, especially for artists. anyway, fashion comes and goes, that stereotype might have become obsolete.

ZenoArrow 11y ago

Whilst personally I believe stereotypes can be accurate (mostly as the outcome of self-fulfilling prophecies), I would question this research. Take a look at the studies listed on page 10, each of the studies looks at a different question about stereotypes, with the answer based on the response of a few hundred people (maximum was around 700). Furthermore, the people used for the studies are all college students. I wouldn't trust the scientific accuracy of any data on human opinion that relied on such small data sets, especially when the people being questioned are from a non-representative slice of society.

danieltillett 11y ago
I think the point the article was making is there is no evidence that stereotypes are inaccurate and all the evidence we have is they are accurate. Of course it might be that all the studies are wrong, but the evidence to date doesn't point that way.
- ZenoArrow 11y ago
  My point was that the evidence isn't strong enough. Asking a relatively small group of students about their views on stereotypes isn't enough to base any strong conclusions on the views of the population at large, larger studies (10000+ people) with a wider group of people (different ages, different backgrounds) would give a much stronger footing for this research.
  - danieltillett 11y ago
    Well as the authors pointed out we have two competing hypothesis: Stereotypes are accurate or stereotypes are inaccurate. So far all the evidence suggests that they are accurate with no evidence suggesting that the are inaccurate. While the evidence we have might be wrong for various reasons, but you don’t just get to dismiss it without other evidence - gut feeling is not evidence. One of the more interesting things about the paper is the evidence we have for stereotypes being accurate is the evidence for this is some of the strongest in physiological studies. Almost everything else we know has less support. As for how strong does evidence have to be before you will believe you need to provide us with a p value you consider would be convincing.
Asbostos 11y ago
Not trying to be offensive, but did you feel the need to add the statement abut self-fulfilling prophecies because making a bare claim like "I believe in some stereotypes" is so politically sensitive that you're afraid of being judged as a racist or sexist? This is similar to the sort of complains the author has about older research into stereotypes assuming they were inaccurate without testing them - no doubt they made that assumption to protect themselves from allegations of racism/sexism/etc. The self-fulfilling prophecy argument is a way to say "OK, they might be true, but the blame lies with some other group of oppressors and it's still not an innate quality of the subjects themselves, so it's still not really fundamentally true.". Why shouldn't it be an innate quality? Maybe women really do earn less than men because of something different in how men and women earn money, not because men oppress women with their stereotypes. Without research, I don't think it's any more reasonable to say "stereotypes are mainly accurate because they're self-fulfilling prophecies" than to say "stereotypes are mainly accurate because groups of people are naturally different.".

yaloiseau 11y ago

The authors want to introduce pure binary logical reasoning into social science. Therefore, from a logical point of view, if a statement or belief about a group is accurate, the it must old for all members of the group. Following their pseudo logical reasoning, it follows that a single counter example imply that the belief is not true, and thus inaccurate. Which invalidate any further statistical analysis.

Asbostos 11y ago
They said that in the first couple of pages. I know it's long and wordy, but it gets more practical and down to earth the further into it you go. They have addressed your concern in quite a lot of detail.
- yaloiseau 11y ago
  My point is that they kind of dismiss previous approaches using this only logical argument, which is not applicable anyway. Using such a rigorous logical reasoning in the realm of social science demonstrate either a misunderstanding of logic or a purpose to mislead the reader.
  - Asbostos 11y ago
    I agree that whole argument seemed quite artificial. I took it as a way to complain about other researchers who apparently had assumed that all stereotypes are somehow false, whatever false means. I'm sure they didn't mean it must hold for each individual in the group to be accurate.
    - roninb 11y ago
      But the definition that they use is "a stereotype is a set of beliefs about the personal attributes of a social group." How can that be interpreted as anything but something that holds true for each individual of a group?
  - vanattab 11y ago

AndrewKemendo 11y ago

This is an academic exercise, as it implicitly accepts that there are natural "groups" in which members share the same attributes and as a result individuals within those groups can be expected to either 1) act together or 2) if apart act in a similar way as individuals. In fact there is nothing of the sort, groups are a creation of the social mind and the individual elements may or may not behave similar as individuals. The brain naturally makes heuristics and clusters items that it finds similar into the same group. "Stereotypes," which may be globally common traits but are attributed with higher weight to certain socially constructed groups, can memetically reinforce those groupings by making them more cognitively "available." There is no rational solution to this - as it's a biological process. Like Beer, pattern matching and grouping is the cause of and solution to all of our problems.