Linda R. Tropp, PEP Co-Director, and colleague's research on intergroup contact and prejudice featured in Phys.org [1]
For more than 50 years, social scientists and practitioners have suggested that having members of different groups interact with each other can be an effective tool for reducing prejudice. Emerging research points to a more complex and nuanced understanding of the effects of contact between groups, say Linda R. Tropp, PEP Co-Director, and colleague. Tropp says in Phys.org [2] that studies from the last 10 to 15 years suggest that the positive effects of intergroup contact tend to be weaker among members of historically advantaged groups, such as white people and heterosexuals, compared to the effects typically observed among members of historically disadvantaged groups such as people of color and sexual minorities. There has also been growing concern that contact may effectively reduce prejudice between groups but do little to change existing social inequalities, she adds. Research published in Nature Human Behaviour, and also featured in EurekAlert [3] and News Medical Life Sciences [4]. Tropp was also interviewed on Pell Center public television program, "Story in the Public Square" [5], about this work.