Relationship between Self-Typicality and the In-Group Subtypes Effect

Abstract

According to previous research, members of a social category draw a greater number of subtype distinctions within their own category than nonmembers do. But do category members themselves differ in the number of in-group subtype distinctions that they draw? In Study 1, students who considered themselves relatively typical of their fraternity or sorority listed a greater number of subtypes for their own than for other fraternities or sororities; students who considered themselves relatively atypical did not. In Study 2, athletes listed a greater number of subtypes for their own sports team if they were considered relatively typical by both themselves and teammates than if they were considered relatively typical only by themselves, only by teammates, or by neither. Possible explanations for the "in-group subtypes effect" are discussed.

Subtyping and Subgrouping: Processes for the Prevention and Promotion of Stereotype Change

“…Perceivers categorize by subgroup especially when they have both knowledge and involvement via familiarity and social identity. In general, people identify more subgroups for their in-group than their out-group (see Park & Rothbart, 1982), whether their in-group consists of young people (Brewer & Lui, 1984), ethnic or racial groups (Huddy & Virtanen, 1995;Judd, Park, Ryan, Brauer, & Kraus, 1995), business or engineering students (Park & Judd, 1990), a fraternity or sorority (Wallace, Lord, & Ramsey, 1995) or student athletes (Wallace et al, 1995). The in-group social identity provides a sense of positive distinctiveness that also motivates subgrouping to the extent that one considers oneself typical of the subgroup (Brewer & Lui, 1984;Huddy & Virtanen, 1995;Wallace et al, 1995).…”

Exclusion As Self-Protection

“…Because of the experimental focus on subtyping as a vehicle for stereotype preservation, starting with Allport (1954) and continuing to the present day (e.g., Richards & Hewstone, 2001), researchers have primarily been concerned with the consequences of these categorization processes for the perception of outgroups and outgroup members. Some research has examined the role of perceived subgroups within ingroups and outgroups as it relates to perceived group variability and the outgroup homogeneity effect (e.g., Park et al, 1992; Wallace, Lord, & Ramsey, 1995), but the consequences of subtyping ingroup members for self -evaluations and for evaluations of one’s ingroup has not been explored. Examining the implications of subtyping atypical ingroup members for performance evaluations is pertinent because ingroup members are central to how we evaluate our groups and ourselves.…”