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In
sociology
Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of Empirical ...
and
social psychology
Social psychology is the scientific study of how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the real or imagined presence of other people or by social norms. Social psychologists typically explain human behavior as a result of the r ...
, an in-group is a
social group
In the social sciences, a social group can be defined as two or more people who interact with one another, share similar characteristics, and collectively have a sense of unity. Regardless, social groups come in a myriad of sizes and varieties ...
to which a person
psychologically identifies as being a member. By contrast, an out-group is a social group with which an individual does not identify. People may for example identify with their
peer group
In sociology, a peer group is both a social group and a Primary and secondary groups, primary group of people who have similar interests (homophily), age, background, or social status. The members of this group are likely to influence the person's ...
,
family
Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...
,
community
A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, tow ...
, sports team, political party, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or nation. It has been found that the psychological membership of social groups and categories is associated with a wide variety of phenomena.
The terminology was made popular by
Henri Tajfel
Henri Tajfel (born Hersz Mordche; 22 June 1919 – 3 May 1982) was a Polish social psychologist, best known for his pioneering work on the cognitive aspects of prejudice and social identity theory, as well as being one of the founders of the E ...
and colleagues beginning in the 1970s during his work in formulating
social identity theory
Social identity is the portion of an individual's self-concept derived from perceived membership in a relevance, relevant social group.
As originally formulated by social psychologists Henri Tajfel and John C. Turner, John Turner in the 1970s ...
. The significance of in-group and out-group categorization was identified using a method called the
minimal group paradigm The minimal group paradigm is a method employed in social psychology. Although it may be used for a variety of purposes, it is best known as a method for investigating the minimal conditions required for discrimination to occur between groups. Exper ...
. Tajfel and colleagues found that people can form self-preferencing in-groups within a matter of minutes and that such groups can form even on the basis of completely arbitrary and invented discriminatory characteristics, such as preferences for certain paintings.
In
neurology
Neurology (from el, wikt:νεῦρον, νεῦρον (neûron), "string, nerve" and the suffix wikt:-logia, -logia, "study of") is the branch of specialty (medicine), medicine dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of co ...
, there is an established literature
about the innate propensity of the human brain to divide the world into us and them valence categories, where the exact membership of the in-group and out-group are socially contingent (hence vulnerable to the instruments of
propaganda
Propaganda is communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded ...
), and the intensity exists along a spectrum from mild to complete
dehumanization
Dehumanization is the denial of full humanness in others and the cruelty and suffering that accompanies it. A practical definition refers to it as the viewing and treatment of other persons as though they lack the mental capacities that are c ...
of the "othered" group.
Associated phenomena
The psychological categorization of people into in-group and out-group members is associated with a variety of phenomena. The following examples have all received a great deal of academic attention.
In-group favoritism
This refers to the fact that under certain conditions, people will prefer and have affinity for one's in-group over the out-group, or anyone viewed as outside the in-group. This can be expressed in one's evaluation of others, linking, allocation of resources, and many other ways.
How we perceive the actions of others are also affected by in-group favoritism. People may perceive the same action very differently depending on whether the action was executed by a member of the same group or a member of a different group.
In fact, people tend to evaluate actions of their own group or team members much more favorably than those of outgroup members.
An illustrative example of the way this phenomenon takes place can be demonstrated just by arbitrarily assigning a person to a distinct and objectively meaningless novel group; this alone is sufficient to create intergroup biases in which members of the perceiver’s own group are preferentially favored. This phenomenon was demonstrated in an empirical study conducted by Molenberghs and colleagues in 2013.
In the study, participants were arbitrarily divided into two teams where they watched videos of individuals of competing teams and individuals from their own team perform hand actions. Participants were then asked to judge the speed of the hand movements.
On average participants judged members of their own teams to be faster, although the hand movements were the exact same speed across the board. Similarly, Hastorf and Cantril conducted a pioneering study in 1954, where students of both Princeton and Dartmouth viewed a contentious football game between their two teams.
Although they had watched the same motion picture of the game, their versions of what transpired were so starkly different it appeared as though they had watched two totally different games.
Neural mechanisms of in-group favoritism and out-group bias
Some may wonder why in-group favoritism takes place, even in arbitrarily assigned groups where group members have nothing in common other than the group to which they were assigned. Research points to unconscious decision making processes that takes place at the
neurological
Neurology (from el, νεῦρον (neûron), "string, nerve" and the suffix -logia, "study of") is the branch of medicine dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of conditions and disease involving the brain, the spinal ...
level, where in-group favoritism and out-group bias occurs very early in perception. This process can begin by simply viewing a person's face. Research indicates that individuals are faster and more accurate at recognizing faces of ingroup vs. outgroup members. For example, researchers in a cross-race recognition study recorded blood oxygenation level-dependent signal (BOLD) activity from black and white participants while they viewed and attempted to remember pictures of unfamiliar black faces, white faces and objects.
They found that participants in this study exhibited greater activity in the
fusiform face area
The fusiform face area (FFA, meaning spindle-shaped face area) is a part of the human visual system (while also activated in people blind from birth) that is specialized for facial recognition. It is located in the inferior temporal cortex ( ...
(FFA), an area of the
fusiform gyrus
The fusiform gyrus, also known as the ''lateral occipitotemporal gyrus'','' ''is part of the temporal lobe and occipital lobe in Brodmann area 37. The fusiform gyrus is located between the lingual gyrus and parahippocampal gyrus above, and the inf ...
located in the inferior temporal cortex of the brain linked to object and face recognition, when viewing same race faces compared to other race faces.
Lower activity in the FFA reflects a failure to encode outgroup members at the individual level rather than the categorical level, which comes at the expense of encoding individuating information. This suggests out-group or unfamiliar faces may not be "faces" with the same intensity as in-group faces. Prior research has also shown that the devaluation and dehumanization of outgroup members is exacerbated when the initial encoding and configural processing of an outgroup face is impeded. So not only does this initial encoding process dehumanize outgroup members, it also contributes to a homogeneity effect, whereby outgroup members are perceived as more similar to each other than ingroup members.
Group homogeneity
Categorization of people into social groups increases the perception that group members are similar to one another. An outcome of this is the out-group homogeneity effect. This refers to the perception of members of an out-group as being homogenous, while members of one's in-group are perceived as being diverse, e.g. "they are alike; we are diverse”.
This is especially likely to occur in regard to negative characteristics. Under certain conditions, in-group members can be perceived as being similar to one another in regard to positive characteristics. This effect is called in-group homogeneity.
Out-group derogation
Discrimination between in-groups and out-groups is a matter of favoritism towards an in-group and the absence of equivalent favoritism towards an out-group. Out-group derogation is the phenomenon in which an out-group is perceived as being threatening to the members of an in-group. This phenomenon often accompanies in-group favoritism, as it requires one to have an affinity towards their in-group. Some research suggests that out-group derogation occurs when an out-group is perceived as blocking or hindering the goals of an in-group. It has also been argued that out-group derogation is a natural consequence of the categorization process.
Social influence
People have been shown to be differentially influenced by in-group members. That is, under conditions where group categorization is psychologically salient, people will shift their beliefs in line with in-group
social norms
Social norms are shared standards of acceptable behavior by groups. Social norms can both be informal understandings that govern the behavior of members of a society, as well as be codified into rules and laws. Social normative influences or soci ...
.
Group polarization
This generally refers to the tendency of groups to make decisions that are more extreme than the initial inclination of its members, although polarization toward the most central beliefs has also been observed. It has been shown that this effect is related to a psychologically salient in-group and outgroup categorization.
Postulated role in human evolution
In
evolutionary psychology
Evolutionary psychology is a theoretical approach in psychology that examines cognition and behavior from a modern evolutionary perspective. It seeks to identify human psychological adaptations with regards to the ancestral problems they evolv ...
, in-group favoritism is seen as an evolved mechanism selected for the advantages of
coalition
A coalition is a group formed when two or more people or groups temporarily work together to achieve a common goal. The term is most frequently used to denote a formation of power in political or economical spaces.
Formation
According to ''A Gui ...
affiliation. It has been argued that characteristics such as gender and
ethnicity
An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...
are inflexible or even
essential features of such systems. However, there is evidence that elements of favoritism are flexible in that they can be erased by changes in social categorization. One study in the field of
behavioural genetics
Behavioural genetics, also referred to as behaviour genetics, is a field of scientific research that uses genetic methods to investigate the nature and origins of individual differences in behaviour. While the name "behavioural genetics" co ...
suggests that biological mechanisms may exist which favor a coexistence of both flexible and
essentialist
Essentialism is the view that objects have a set of attributes that are necessary to their identity. In early Western thought, Plato's idealism held that all things have such an "essence"—an "idea" or "form". In ''Categories'', Aristotle si ...
systems.
See also
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ingroups And Outgroups
Sociological terminology
Group processes
Dichotomies
Prejudice and discrimination
Authoritarianism
Collective identity