ABSTRACT

Warmth and competence are two fundamental dimensions of social judgments that shape stereotypes of social groups/professions. In perceiving others, people assess their intentions (warmth) and their abilities to act upon those intentions (competence). As stereotyping can influence attitudes and subsequent behaviors, pre-existing stereotypes of scientists as ‘cold’ may undermine trust in science and interest in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education. How, then, can scientists portray interpersonal warmth? Drawing on the stereotype content model’s warmth-competence literature, this study aimed to communicate scientists’ interpersonal warmth using the morality and emotional aspects of the warmth dimension in the context of a College of Agriculture and Natural Resources (CANR) as a test case of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) colleges. We used two, 3 (message type: control, prosocial, emotional-prosocial) × 2 (gender: women, men) between-subjects experimental design (n = 849) to examine the effect of message type and participant’s gender on perceptions of scientists’ interpersonal warmth. Results suggest that the combination of prosocial behaviors and emotional appeals were associated with perceived warmth of scientists. Furthermore, there was a significant interaction between message type and gender (Experiment 1) and a significant main effect of gender on perceived warmth (Experiment 2). These findings suggest further exploration of the morality and sociability aspects associated with warmth to reduce unflattering stereotypes of scientists.

摘要

热情和能力是塑造社会群体/职业刻板印象的社会判断的两个基本维度。在感知他人时，人们会评估自己的意图（热情）以及根据这些意图采取行动的能力（能力）。由于刻板印象会影响态度和随后的行为，先前存在的科学家“冷”的刻板印象可能会破坏对科学的信任和对 STEM（科学、技术、工程和数学）教育的兴趣。那么，科学家如何描绘人际间的温暖呢？借鉴刻板印象内容模型的温暖能力文献，本研究旨在以农业与自然资源学院（CANR）作为科学测试案例，利用温暖维度的道德和情感方面来传达科学家的人际温暖。 , 技术, 工程和数学 (STEM) 学院。我们使用了2、3（消息类型：控制、亲社会、情感-亲社会）×2（性别：女性、男性）之间的受试者实验设计（n  = 849) 以检查信息类型和参与者的性别对科学家人际温暖感知的影响。结果表明，亲社会行为和情感诉求的结合与科学家感知到的温暖有关。此外，信息类型和性别之间存在显着的交互作用（实验 1），性别对感知温暖的主效应显着（实验 2）。这些发现建议进一步探索与温暖相关的道德和社交方面，以减少对科学家不利的刻板印象。