Abstract

PEREIRA, Cícero; TORRES, Ana Raquel Rosas  and  ALMEIDA, Saulo Teles. A study of prejudice from a social representation perspective: analysis of the influence of a justifying discourse on racial prejudice discrimination. Psicol. Reflex. Crit. [online]. 2003, vol.16, n.1, pp. 95-107. ISSN 0102-7972.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S0102-79722003000100010.

This paper analyses the influence, from a social representations view, of a justifying discourse about racial prejudice. In an experiment (N = 120), it was presented to participants a scenario where a shop manager hires a white girl discriminating a black one. Half of participants also received a discourse justifying the manager's decision. The results show that the representation of that decision is organized in two principles: professional evaluation and justice perception. The participants who had access to the justifying discourse considered the manager's decision as been more professional and less unfair than the participants who did not see that discourse. The former group was also more tended to hire the white girl, while the other group did not show a racial preference. The discussion presents modern prejudice as a result of ideological discourses produced by majority groups to justify their social position.

Keywords : Racial prejudice; social representations; ideological discourse.