Stereotypes, emotions, and behaviours in intergroup context in Portugal

Abstract

Stereotype content has been much studied since the classic study by Katz and Braly (1933). The results obtained in these studies have been fundamental to building more complex experiments in order to explore the formation, purpose and maintenance of stereotypes. In Portugal, to our knowledge, the existing studies are quite scarce, and in some cases non-existent, particularly related to some social groups of interest. Furthermore, continuous social changes may bring variation in the meaning and importance of each attribute. The goal of this study is to explore and pre-test the stereotype content of 12 social groups in Portugal. Ninety-eight participants recruited online via social media responded to 35 stereotypic traits and their valence, 21 emotions and 12 behavioural tendencies related to these social groups. The results allow not only the selection of, for each group, the stereotypic traits, emotions, and behavioural tendencies that are significantly different from the midpoint of the scale, but also the identification of traits, emotions and behavioural tendencies that best seem to differentiate the different groups.