Us Vs Them Effect Essay

According to The New York Post, the number of cancer cases of 9/11 first respondents had hugely increased from 1,140 to over 2,500 within a year. However, the epidemiologists from Mount Sinai hospital do not agree with the double of this case as it is crucial to ‘be careful and try to understand what you are comparing.’ The hospital also conducts research and finds out that, comparing to the general population in America, there is an approximately 20% increase in cancer incidence in 9/11 rescue and recovery workers. The particular diseases that they are exposed to are thyroid and prostate cancer, myeloma and leukemia. However, this result causes questions due to some contributing factors, including over diagnosis of certain cancers which are thyroid and prostate and the continued aging of the first respondents. This case is significant as 9/11 is still having an impact on American society, being more than a significant historical incident for Americans, although the search for a similar context would be able to frustrate researchers.

Based on the results given in the Zimbardo experiment, Zimbardo (1975) contended that identity contrasts of the subjects were substantially less vital than the social circumstance. Zimbardo went considerably more further with his experiment than Milgram had by rejecting the significance of identity qualities for a large portion of one’s behavior in regular day to day existence: He states, Individual behavior is largely under the control of social forces and environmental contingencies rather than personality traits, character, will power or other empirically invalidated constructs. Thus, we create an illusion of freedom by attributing more internal control to ourselves, to the individual, than it actually exists. Thus underestimating the power and pervasiveness of situational controls over behavior because: 1) they are often non-obvious and subtle, 2) we can often avoid entering situations where we might be so controlled, and 3) we label as “weak” or “deviant” people in those situations who do behave differently from how we believe we would. (p. 115)

The acts of conforming and obeying shape us significantly, whether we are conscious of it or not. They do so in ways that psychologists Solomon Asch and Stanley Milgram attempt to explain through their research. Asch touches base on the topic of conformity and discusses the ways in which group behaviors and social norms can influence the decisions an individual makes. On the other hand, Milgram’s focus is on obedience, and he studied it by measuring average, everyday people and their willingness to obey authority figures, even if it involves actions that go against their personal beliefs and morals. They have provided evidence through experiments, and with this information, it becomes easier to understand the world of politics, and how these

Groups can influence people’s perception and ideas even if they contradict their own. Groups can act as an entity of authority, and for some people it is difficult to stand out or think differently than their peers. “When we’re in a

The social identity theory is a theory developed by Henry Tajfel, in which Tajfel believes that who we are socially determines how many positive feelings we have towards ourselves. Basically, if we like where we stand socially, then we will like who we are and display happiness. In this theory, Tajfel labels the “in group” and the “out group” and says that we will always compare our “in group” to another’s “out group.” By comparing these groups, we develop a better personal view on ourselves (King, 2009). A big factor of the social identity theory is that the groups will tend to critique the differences of the groups, and overlook the similarities. A modern day example of the social identity theory would be your everyday high school cheerleaders versus band members. The cheerleaders think of themselves as the queen bees of the school,

     The United States and its people take great pride in knowing that the U.S. is the greatest nation in the world. That is why it’s our duty to father the rest of the world when conflicts arise. American culture and ideals are also thought to take precedents over all other cultures and ideals. In the book, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall down, written by Anne Fadiman, there are many great examples of how American culture is imposed on the people residing with in its enclosed boundaries. The U.S. going to war in Vietnam is also a great example of how the U.S. tried to impose American values on the “less fortunate.” Through understanding America’s so

Salomon E. Asch in his essay “Opinions and Social Pressure” conducted an experiment to determine effects of group pressure towards an individual and concluded that there is a very strong tendency to conformity even when doing so conflicting with their own senses of morality. In the experiment a group of young students have to compare length of lines on two different sheets of paper. On one of them there is a sample single line and on the other one there are three lines only one of which is same size as the sample line from the first sheet. People taking part in this experiment are instructed to point at lines that are the same length. At first, during the experiment the group is

People endorse whichever position reinforces their connection to others with whom they share important commitments.

This experiment found that when a group of two other people refused to obey the conditions of the experiment, then the third person would most likely do the same.  It was found that, “The presence of others who are seen to disobey the authority figure reduces the level of obedience to 10%” (McLeod 588). A similar finding is noted in Solomon Asch’s “Opinions and Social Pressure”, where it was found that when someone is among their peers, they are more likely to conform to the group opinion. Asch acknowledges that social pressure plays a large role because the individual “must declare his judgments in public, before a majority which has also stated its position publicly” (Asch 599). This confirms the idea that an individual is more likely to conform when they are being judged by their

“Although humans exhibit strong preferences for equity and moral prohibitions against harm in many context, people’s priorities change when there is an ‘us’ and ‘them’” (Saxe). Within society, many individuals are beginning to identify with various groups that begin to tear each other down, rather than lift each other up. The urge to fit in eventually overpowers the mind of one’s independence. The need to be accepted and to have the approval of others ultimately conflicts with one’s own morals and beliefs. Although individualism is highly praised, one’s surface attributes and appearance may have a negative connotation in that they are categorized as a specific stereotype, therefore these ideas will turn toxic as one is automatically grouped

Social identity theory proposed by Tajfel & Turner (2004) is a theory of group membership and behaviour which has made significant contributions in explaining in-group favouritism, out-group denigration, competition and other interactions of an individual among social groups (Korte, 2007; Brown, 2000; Tajfel & Turner, 2004). Social identity theory can be defined as an individual’s sense of who they are based on the group that they belong to through a process of self-categorisation and depersonalisation (Tajfel & Turner, 2004). In this essay, I will define social identity theory through its three mental processes involved in group evaluation which are: social identification which is a process whereby we are placed into certain

“In matches between the two groups of football teams, the teams from the same state as the umpires received more favorable decisions than the other teams did by a margin of 11% for the 171 games studied.” In situations where the umpires had to allocate rewards to members of a group they identified with competing against a group they did not identify with they clearly favored their ingroup. This study helped proved the theory that intergroup competition is a prevalent reason why ingroup favoritism is often exhibited in society. This idea is completely embedded into the entire sporting culture of our society today. We group ourselves together with the “home team” or the ingroup. We prefer for that group, as well as ourselves by association, to be successful. The second explanation that is usually offered is the idea that people will have a better opinion of people in their ingroup in order to boost their own self-esteem by association. Robert Cialdini conducted a very interesting study on a concept called Basking in Reflected Glory (BIRG) at several different universities. In order to study how self-esteem was a determinant of ingroup bias, Cialdini and his team researched the behavior of students after victories and losses of the school’s football teams. Their results “Demonstrated the BIRG phenomenon by showing a greater tendency for university students to wear

One could argue that this then inflates our sense of belonging in the world if we feel that there are others who share similar values to us. This then strengthens our resolve by essentially confirming that we are engaging in the right behaviours and holding the right ideals as we associate ourselves with others who feel the same as we do. This then leads them to strengthen our tenacity of in-group favouritism by rewarding our prejudiced behaviours. A positive outcome of this is that it can have a flow on effect to our altruistic nature as human beings and we would be more likely to help those with whom we feel a certain affiliation. It is in this regard that the Social Identity Theory can yield positive results through a framework of philanthropic behaviour and support for in-group members. The converse of this behaviour is that we see an increase in negative behaviours towards those with whom we feel have conflicting goals and essentially belong to an “out group”.

People who are in a group or belong to and even assigned to the group, they would naturally think of the member within that group as the in-groups while others outside the group would be the out-groups. This can be explained by social categorization. People would normally categorize other people into different categories, including themselves. And bond between the in-groups would form. This however, would develop a discrimination between the in-group and out-group where people would favor the in-group more. Social categorization can be seen in the study done by Cialdini et .al (1976). The main purpose of the study is to find out whether people would favor their own “in-group” members more than the other people, the “out-groups”. Researcher uses two methods. First, researchers find fans from 7 different large United State prestigious football universities in a field experiment. Researchers then observed the student’s

An individual’s identity is shaped and created by many factors such as family, culture, and friendship groups (Trepte, S. 2206). The individual’s personal identity of “self” may alter when interacting with any of these groups due to the influence and the characteristics these groups possess (Burke, PJ. Sets, JE. 2000). The human desire to feel a sense of belonging is the driving force for individuals to create themselves around particular groups (Trepte, S. 2206). When people find out that their experiences, thoughts and feelings are mirrored by other people, an immediately connection is formed due to the understanding that they are not isolated in their experiences (Rogers, W.S. 2011). The common ground individuals find in others, allows for the formation of groups (Trepte, S. 2206). The “commonality” amongst certain groups of people allow for Social Categorization (Burke, PJ. Sets, JE. 2000). Social