Psychological essentialism and the differential attribution of uniquely human emotions to ingroups and outgroups

TLDR

Psychological essentialism posits that people explain group differences by attributing distinct essences, and ethnocentrism leads to a belief that the human essence is confined to the ingroup, resulting in more uniquely human characteristics being attributed to ingroup members than to outgroup members. This article investigates whether secondary emotions—both positive and negative—constitute such uniquely human characteristics that are differentially attributed to ingroups versus outgroups. Participants estimated the means of two numeric distributions purported to represent ingroup and outgroup characteristics, thereby revealing their attribution patterns. Across three studies, high‑ and low‑status groups consistently attributed more positive and negative secondary emotions to the ingroup than to the outgroup, and the absence of emotion exemplars in Study 3 further demonstrated a reluctance to attribute secondary emotions to the outgroup, supporting the essentialist framework. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract

Abstract According to the psychological essentialism perspective, people tend to explain differences between groups by attributing them different essences. Given a pervasive ethnocentrism, this tendency implies that the human essence will be restricted to the ingroup whereas outgroups will receive a lesser degree of humanity. Therefore, it is argued that people attribute more uniquely human characteristics to the ingroup than to the outgroup. The present article focuses on secondary emotions that constitute such characteristics. Study 1 showed that members of high‐ and low‐status groups attribute more positive secondary emotions to the ingroup than to the outgroup. Study 2 verified that the differential attribution extended also to negative secondary emotions. No exemplars of emotions were provided in Study 3. Instead, participants had to estimate the means of two distributions of numbers that supposedly represented characteristics of the ingroup and of the outgroup. The results of this third experiment illustrated the reluctance to attribute secondary emotions to the outgroup. The findings are discussed from the perspective of psychological essentialism. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.