Thesiss

Drawing upon intergroup contact theory (Allport, 1954; Pettigrew 1998) and the emerging literature on intergroup climate (e.g., Christ et al., 2013, 2014), I utilised various antipathetic intergroup relationships (e.g., Black people vs. White people; non-Muslims vs. Muslims), an…

Recent research has documented the negative intergroup attitudes between Jewish and Arab youth and adults in the Middle East (Bar-Tal & Teichman, 2005; Brenick et al., 2007; Cole et al., 2003), yet little is known about how these negative intergroup biases manifest in the same c…

The current research investigated how power-related motivations affect the way group members approach intergroup contact and how certain types of contact might affect power relations between groups. Due to different motivations for change in the status quo (i.e., change in the p…

Guided by intergroup contact theory, social identity theory, and politeness theory, this experimental study examined the effects of the target's Muslim religious identity salience (high and low) and message politeness strategies (direct and indirect) on non-Muslim American parti…

The extended contact hypothesis states that contact with an ingroup member, who has an outgroup friend, facilitates favorable outgroup attitudes (Wright, Aron, McLaughlin-Volpe, & Ropp, 1997). An experimental manipulation examined the hypothesis’ assumption that ingroup identity…

The absence of diverse perspectives, coupled with a Eurocentric lens of analyzing history and literature, substantially limits opportunities for dialogue about race, culture, and experience (Bondi, 2012; Chapman, 2013; Schieble, 2012). As a result, White students often fail to s…

Media messages help construct and express intergroup perceptions, define boundaries between ingroups and outgroups, and shape a sense of belonging to social groups. Drawing upon social psychology, intergroup and mass communication, this study focuses on Muslims, a group that has…

The present studies examine the effect of psychological essentialism on the relationship between contact and attitudes with regard to religious outgroup members, specifically atheists. Although previous research has been conducted that examines the relationship between outgroup …

This dissertation seeks to contribute to both the theory and practice of reconciliation by offering a theoretical framework for reconciliation that can be used by scholars to test the effects of various interventions designed to promote reconciliation, and by implementing the fi…