Group cohesion benefits individuals who express prejudice, but harms their group.

By D Effron, Hemant Kakkar, E Knowles
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology | 2018

Citation

Effron, D., Kakkar, Hemant., Knowles, E. Group cohesion benefits individuals who express prejudice, but harms their group. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology .

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2018

Abstract

When someone expresses prejudice against an outgroup, how negatively dowe judge the prejudiced individual and his or her ingroup? Previous lines of research suggest that the answer depends on the ingroup's entitativity — i.e., how cohesive it is — but they make different predictions about whether entitativity should increase or decrease outside observers' negative reactions to prejudice. We resolve this tension by demonstrating divergent consequences of entitativity for prejudiced individuals versus their groups. Mediational and experimental data from six studies (two pre-registered; N=2455) support two hypotheses: Entitativity increases how responsible the group seems for its member's prejudice, which in turn decrease show unacceptable observers find the member's behavior and how much they condemn her (H1), but which also increases how much they condemn the group (H2). Thus, entitativity can grant individuals a license to express prejudice but can damage their group's reputation.

Hemant Kakkar is an Associate Professor of Organisational Behaviour at the Indian School of Business (ISB). Prior to this, he served as an Assistant and Associate (untenured) Professor of Management and Organisations at the Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. He received his doctoral degree in Organisational Behaviour from London Business School.
His research draws on social psychology and evolutionary theories of status and influence to examine judgments and behaviours of individuals and groups within social hierarchies. He also examines individuals' tendencies to engage in both positive and negative deviant behaviours.

He was awarded the 2021 Alvah H. Chapman Jr. Outstanding Dissertation Award, as well as, the Outstanding Dissertation Award 2021 by the International Association of Conflict Management. His research has also won Best Conference Paper awards from the Conflict Management Division of the Academy of Management (2021) and the International Association of Conflict Management (2021).

His research is published in leading academic journals, including the Academy of Management Journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Journal of Applied Psychology, Nature Human Behaviour, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, and Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. His research has also been featured in several popular media outlets, such as The Washington Post, Forbes, The Atlantic, Scientific American, The Times UK, and the Harvard Business Review.

At ISB, Professor Kakkar teaches the core course in Organisational Behaviour.  He has also taught Foundations of Organisational Behaviour to postgraduate students and graduate-level seminar courses at the Fuqua School of Business. In 2021, he received the Award for Excellence in Teaching for the MMS program. Before joining academia, he worked as a Technical Consultant at Tata Consultancy Services Ltd., India.

More publications by author

Hemant Kakkar