Affective And Behavioral Responses To Racism

The current edition of Science magazine contains an interesting discussion of the paradox of the condemnation of overt racial prejudice and the frequent occurrence of blatantly racist acts. From the report's abstract: "The present research demonstates that although people predicted that they would be very upset by a racist act, when people actually experienced this event they showed relatively little emotional distress. Furthermore, people overestimated the degreee to which a racist comment would provoke social rejection of the racist. These findings suggest that racism may persevere in part because people who anticipate feeling upset and believe that they will take action may actually respond with indifference when faced with an act of racism."