A PhD thesis developed at the University of Granada has been announced the winner of the IV (2020) Research Prize for Young Doctors, organised by the Spanish Scientific Society of Social Psychology
According to the researchers, there are parts of the population that dehumanise people of low socioeconomic status, considering them inferior beings with traits that are more characteristic of animals than humans—for example, being irrational or impulsive
Research carried out at the University of Granada (UGR) suggests that certain parts of the population dehumanise people of low socioeconomic status, considering them inferior beings with traits that are more characteristic of animals than humans—for example, irrational or impulsive behaviours.
The research is part of the PhD thesis of Mario Sainz Martínez, which was supervised by Professors Rosa Rodríguez Bailón and Miguel Moya Morales of the UGR’s Department of Social Psychology. Rocío Martínez, a lecturer at the Department, also contributed to the study. The work has recently been announced the winner of the IV (2020) Research Prize for Young Doctors, organised by the Spanish Scientific Society of Social Psychology.
The current rise in economic inequality that we are witnessing in our society is particularly affecting those collectives with a low socioeconomic status—that is, poor people or those of a low social class. Despite this reality, today many people are against public policies that seek to reduce inequality, for example by redistributing wealth from the individuals and/or groups with the most to those who have the least. In this prize-winning study, the UGR researchers sought to understand the factors that might be influencing this opposition to public policies designed to help the most vulnerable in our society.
“We started from the basis of our previous work, in which we identified that people with a low socioeconomic status are dehumanised by others,” the authors explain. “Specifically, poor people and/or groups are seen by certain parts of the population as inferior beings and as having traits that are more characteristic of animals (such as irrationality or impulsiveness) than human beings. This ‘animalised’ perception of the poorest groups could, according to our hypotheses, be one of the factors that influence how people perceive poverty and their support for, or opposition to, public policies that seek to help this population.”
Animal traits
To test these hypotheses, the researchers conducted two studies (one correlational and the other experimental) in which they asked the participants (a sample of 523 subjects between 18 and 65 years of age) to what extent they considered people with a low socioeconomic status to have characteristics typically associated with human beings or, conversely, more typically associated with animals. The authors also included measures designed to illuminate what the sample believed to be the reasons for which some people find themselves in a situation of poverty, and to what extent the sample considered that policies favour of greater economic equality should be supported.
The results showed that the more an individual tends toward ‘animalising’ poor people—associating them with animal traits—the more they are likely to oppose the implementation of redistributive economic policies. The relationship between these variables seems to be explained by the causes to which people attribute poverty.
“Specifically, the more people ‘animalise’ the poor, the more they blame them for their dire circumstances. This is because people largely consider poverty to be the result of certain traits that they perceive to be characteristic of the poor (for example, that they do not want a job or that they are lazy). At the same time, they minimise the role of external factors such as the difficulty of finding work or the effect of economic recessions),” the authors explain.
In general, these results show how the dehumanisation of the poor influences our interpretation of the causes of poverty and how this, in turn, impacts on our support for, or objection to, wealth distribution policies.
Bibliography:
Sainz, M., Martínez, R., Sutton, R. M., Rodríguez-Bailón, R., & Moya, M. (2020). ‘Less human, more to blame: Animalizing poor people increases blame and decreases support for wealth redistribution’, Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, 23(4), 546–59. Online: https://doi.org/10.1177/1368430219841135
Mario Sainz Martínez, researcher at the UGR and one of the authors of this work
People of low socioeconomic status are dehumanised by certain parts of the population as if they were inferior beings with traits more characteristic of animals (for example, irrationality or impulsiveness) than human beings.
Media enquiries:
Rosa Rodríguez Bailón
The Social Psychology of Inequality Lab: http://wwwlocal.ugr.es/~psidesigualdad/
Department of Social Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, University of Granada
Tel.: +34 958 240690
Email: rrbailon@ugr.es
Mario Sainz Martinez
School of Psychology, University of Monterrey, MexicoEmail: mario.sainz@udem.edu
