James H. Sidanius, [1] known as Jim Sidanius (born James Brown on December 11, 1945 - June 29, 2021) [2] was an American psychologist and academic. He served as John Lindsley Professor of Psychology in memory of William James and of African and African American Studies at Harvard University. [3] He won the 2006 Harold Lasswell Award for "Distinguished Scientific Contribution in the Field of Political Psychology" from the International Society of Political Psychology [4] and the Society for Personality and Social Psychology 2013 Career Contribution Award. [5] He was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2007. [6] The Society of Experimental Social Psychology awarded Sidanius the Scientific Impact Award in 2019. [7]
Sidanius, who was of African American heritage, grew up in New York City. He earned a bachelor's degree in psychology from City College of New York in 1968. [2] He went on to pursue a Ph.D. in psychology at the University of Stockholm, Sweden. [2] His dissertation, passed in 1977, was titled: "Cognitive functioning and Socio-political Ideology: Studies in political psychology." [2] He changed his last name from Brown to Sidanius upon moving to Sweden (where he also obtained citizenship), but returned to the United States in the 1980s as a permanent resident. He was married twice. [1]
Harold Dwight Lasswell was an American political scientist and communications theorist. He earned his bachelor's degree in philosophy and economics and was a PhD student at the University of Chicago. He was a professor of law at Yale University. He studied at the Universities of London, Geneva, Paris, and Berlin in the 1920s. He served as president of the American Political Science Association (APSA), of the American Society of International Law and of the World Academy of Art and Science (WAAS).
Social dominance orientation (SDO) is a personality trait measuring an individual's support for social hierarchy and the extent to which they desire their in-group be superior to out-groups. SDO is conceptualized under social dominance theory as a measure of individual differences in levels of group-based discrimination; that is, it is a measure of an individual's preference for hierarchy within any social system and the domination over lower-status groups. It is a predisposition toward anti-egalitarianism within and between groups.
Lisa Feldman Barrett is a University Distinguished Professor of psychology at Northeastern University, where she focuses on affective science. She is a director of the Interdisciplinary Affective Science Laboratory. Along with James Russell, she is the founding editor-in-chief of the journal Emotion Review. Along with James Gross, she founded the Society for Affective Science.
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. Experiments using this approach have revealed that even arbitrary distinctions between groups, such as preferences for certain paintings, or the color of their shirts, can trigger a tendency to favor one's own group at the expense of others, even when it means sacrificing in-group gain.
Mahzarin Rustum Banaji FBA is an American psychologist of Indian origin at Harvard University, known for her work popularizing the concept of implicit bias in regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, and other factors.
Social dominance theory (SDT) is a social psychological theory of intergroup relations that examines the caste-like features of group-based social hierarchies, and how these hierarchies remain stable and perpetuate themselves. According to the theory, group-based inequalities are maintained through three primary mechanisms: institutional discrimination, aggregated individual discrimination, and behavioral asymmetry. The theory proposes that widely shared cultural ideologies provide the moral and intellectual justification for these intergroup behaviors by serving to make privilege normal. For data collection and validation of predictions, the social dominance orientation (SDO) scale was composed to measure acceptance of and desire for group-based social hierarchy, which was assessed through two factors: support for group-based dominance and generalized opposition to equality, regardless of the ingroup's position in the power structure.
Susan Tufts Fiske is an American psychologist who serves as the Eugene Higgins Professor of Psychology and Public Affairs in the Department of Psychology at Princeton University. She is a social psychologist known for her work on social cognition, stereotypes, and prejudice. Fiske leads the Intergroup Relations, Social Cognition, and Social Neuroscience Lab at Princeton University. Her theoretical contributions include the development of the stereotype content model, ambivalent sexism theory, power as control theory, and the continuum model of impression formation.
Realistic conflict theory (RCT), also known as realistic group conflict theory (RGCT), is a social psychological model of intergroup conflict. The theory explains how intergroup hostility can arise as a result of conflicting goals and competition over limited resources, and it also offers an explanation for the feelings of prejudice and discrimination toward the outgroup that accompany the intergroup hostility. Groups may be in competition for a real or perceived scarcity of resources such as money, political power, military protection, or social status.
Richard E. Petty is university professor of psychology at Ohio State University.
Mark Zanna, FRSC was a social psychologist at the University of Waterloo. He was well known for his work on attitudes and intergroup relations. He earned his Ph.D. from Yale University.
Daniel Bar-Tal is an Israeli academic, author and Branco Weiss Professor of Research in Child Development and Education at School of Education, Tel Aviv University.
David O’Keefe Sears is an American psychologist who specializes in political psychology. He is a distinguished professor of psychology and political science at the University of California, Los Angeles where he has been teaching since 1961. He served as dean of social sciences at UCLA between 1983 and 1992. Best known for his theory of symbolic racism, Sears has published many articles and books about the political and psychological origins of race relations in America, as well as on political socialization and life cycle effects on attitudes, the role of self-interest in attitudes, and multiculturalism. He was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1991.
Richard J. Crisp is an author, blogger, scientist and Professor of Psychology at Durham University. He is co-originator of the imagined contact hypothesis and a major contributor to the field of social psychology.
John Thomas Jost is a social psychologist best known for his work on system justification theory and the psychology of political ideology. Jost received his AB degree in Psychology and Human Development from Duke University (1989), where he studied with Irving E. Alexander, Philip R. Costanzo, David Goldstein, and Lynn Hasher, and his PhD in Social and Political Psychology from Yale University (1995), where he was the last doctoral student of Leonard Doob and William J. McGuire. He was also a doctoral student of Mahzarin R. Banaji and a postdoctoral trainee of Arie W. Kruglanski.
Carsten Karel Willem de Dreu is a Professor of Psychology at Leiden University and previously Behavioral Economics at the University of Amsterdam. He is member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. De Dreu received his PhD in social and organizational psychology from the University of Groningen (1993) and was president of the European Association of Social Psychology and the International Association for Conflict Management. In 2016 he was named Distinguished Research Fellow at the University of Oxford.
Myron Kent Jennings is an American political scientist best known for his path-breaking work on the patterns and development of political preferences and behaviors among young Americans. He is widely held in libraries worldwide and is recognized as one of the "founding fathers" of political socialization research and theory. He is Distinguished Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara and Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Michigan. He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1982, and served as the president of the International Society of Political Psychology in 1989–1990 and as the president of the American Political Science Association in 1997–1998.
Diane M. Mackie is a social psychologist known for her research in the fields of intergroup relations and social influence. She is Professor Emerita of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Intergroup relations refers to interactions between individuals in different social groups, and to interactions taking place between the groups themselves collectively. It has long been a subject of research in social psychology, political psychology, and organizational behavior.
Felicia Pratto is a social psychologist known for her work on intergroup relations, dynamics of power, and social cognition. She is Professor of Psychological Sciences at the University of Connecticut. Pratto is a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science.
Eva G. T. Green is a political scientist and political psychologist. She studies variation in political attitudes and values across countries. Green uses experimental social psychology to measure the attitudes that people across many countries and groups hold towards members of other groups, as manifested for example through xenophobia, beliefs about immigration, and strength of national identity.