Page 358 - The Social Animal

340 The Social Animal

with their day-to-day behavior, and receives too much support and
encouragement from the people around them to be reduced by a
book, a film, or a radio broadcast.

The Effects of Equal-Status Contact Although changes in
attitude might induce changes in behavior, as we have seen, it is often
difficult to change attitudes through education. What social psychol-
ogists have long known, but have only recently begun to understand,
is that changes in behavior can affect changes in attitudes. On the
simplest level, it has been argued that, if blacks and whites could be
brought into direct contact, prejudiced individuals would come into
contact with the reality of their own experience, not simply a stereo-
type; eventually, this would lead to greater understanding. Of course,
the contact must take place in a situation in which blacks and whites
have equal status. Throughout history, many whites have always had
a great deal of contact with blacks, but typically in situations in which
the blacks played such menial roles as slaves, porters, dishwashers,
shoe-shine boys, washroom attendants, and domestics. This kind of
contact only serves to increase stereotyping by whites and thus adds
fuel to their prejudice against blacks. It also increases the resentment
and anger of blacks. Until recently, equal-status contact has been
rare, both because of educational and occupational inequities in our
society and because of residential segregation. The 1954 Supreme
Court decision was the beginning of a gradual change in the fre-
quency of equal-status contact.
Occasionally, even before 1954, isolated instances of equal-sta-
tus integration had taken place. The effects tended to support the
notion that behavior change will produce attitude change. In a pi-
82
oneering study, Morton Deutsch and Mary Ellen Collins exam-
ined the attitudes of whites toward blacks in public housing
projects in 1951. In one housing project, black and white families
were assigned to buildings in a segregated manner; that is, they
were assigned to separate buildings in the same project. In another
integrated project, black and white families were assigned to the
same building. Residents in the integrated project reported a
greater positive change in their attitudes toward blacks after mov-
ing into the project than did residents of the segregated project.
From these findings, it would appear that stateways can change
folkways, that you can legislate morality—not directly, of course,