Introduction dehumanization is a topic with extensive ramifications for both moral psychology and public policy. But, if you are speaking literally, if you say that it is in the brain, as a pencil is in the pocket, then you must mean that it takes up room, that it occupies space, and that would make it very much like a material thing. How do we decide what they deserve and how we ought to treat them. The impact of mechanistic and animalistic dehumanization on. Based on extensive experimental data comparing great apes and human children, michael tomasello reconstructs how early humans gradually became an ultracooperative and, eventually, a moral species. May 31, 20 one facet of this true generosity is that the educator working for freedom and humanization must work with students, with confidence in their own critical consciousness. Exploring the causes of good and evil american psychological association published. The moral psychology of human attitudes to animals. In studies 1 and 2, correlational analyses and structural equation modeling were utilized. The present research deals with two forms of dehumanization. Pdf toward a comprehensive taxonomy of dehumanization. Classic examples include african slaves in the eyes of white americans and jews in the eyes of nazis. A construal level theory perspective tal eyal and nira liberman.
New approaches to understanding the politics of human nature brings historians, scientists, philosophers and artists together in order to discuss the phenomenon of dehumanization. The psychology of cruelty in less than human, david livingstone smith explains how dehumanizing people makes us capable of atrocious acts. New approaches to understanding the politics of human nature. The mental processes of dehumanization include categorization, imagery, metaphor, and transfer of emotions such as disgust, fear, and hatred. Is research assistant at the department of philosophy at the freie universitat berlin and member of the interdisciplinary research project performing culture. The study of dehumanization has implications for areas as diverse as conceptions of what it is to be human, notions of race and racism, war and genocide.
Social cognition considering someones mind recognizes the other as a human being subject to moral treatment. Humanness, dehumanization, and moral psychology university of. Violence, moral disengagement, and psychological essentialism virtually all researchers agree that dehumanization is intimately bound up with mass violence and human rights abuses. Nov 16, 2007 dehumanization dehumanization is a psychological process in which a defined enemy is perceived as less human and thus less deserving of the moral consideration one typically applies to ones fellow human. His research has been published in the top social psychology journals including the journal of personality and social psychology and personality and social psychology bulletin, as well as top specialist journals such as nature climate change. Anything that reduces a person to that of an animal. Justice, morality, and the dehumanization of refugees. Both moral outrage and dehumanization mediated the relationship between perceived harm and severity of punishment. A natural history of human morality offers the most detailed account to date of the evolution of human moral psychology.
In shaver pr, mikulincer m, editors, the social psychology of morality. Humanness emerges as a concept that runs an integrating thread through a variety of research literatures. We argue that humanness has two distinct meanings with distinct implications for moral judgment. The international and interdisciplinary conference dehumanization. This is a serious issue and it will continue to be unless we intend to put a stop to it. Dehumanization has happened many times before and it is still happening throughout the world today. Social psychological research suggests that two distinct dimensions describe. Opponents view each other as less than human and thus not deserving of moral consideration, and are treated as less than humans through subtle or overt acts or statements. In 1961, eisenhower identified and named the militaryindustrial complex and warned of the dangers of failing to keep close watch over it. This activity results in strained relationships between the two parties with hatred and alienation towards conflict. His research focuses on conceptions and attributions of humanness including dehumanization and folk beliefs about the future of society. But at least since platos classic discussion in the second book of the. Jan 01, 2011 dehumanized perception, a failure to spontaneously consider the mind of another person, may be a psychological mechanism facilitating inhumane acts like torture.
Dehumanization is a psychological process whereby opponents view each other as less than human and thus not deserving of moral consideration. This volume presents the latest thinking about these and related questions from research leaders in the field of humanness and dehumanization in social psychology and related disciplines. Finally, we ask what can be done to reduce dehumanization. Sarah gervais department of psychology, university of nebraskalincoln summary the results were inconsistent with our hypotheses but still very interesting. Pdf distortions of mind perception in psychopathology. Social, psychological, and demographic characteristics of dehumanization toward immigrants.
No haslam, undefined bastian, sm laham, undefined loughnan, undefined mikulincer, r shaver the social psychology of morality. Contributions provide new insights into the history of dehumanization, its different types, and new theories are proposed for when and why dehumanization occurs. Though dehumanization research is often applied only to human groups, it is. In addition, when other players are the targets of this violence it reduces our perceptions of their humanity also. Paulo freire, pedagogy, and humanization inventing the. Humanness, dehumanization, and moral psychology nick haslam, brock bastian, simon laham, and stephen loughnan. Pdf dehumanization, moral disengagement, and public. Jan 01, 1992 this is an impressive work of professor schefflers, the aim of which is less to sketch out a distinctively new moral theory so is it to defend the potential for a sort of logical spacecarving. All prospective readers of this book should be prepared for some disturbing and hardhitting rhetoric. Dehumanization, essentialism, and moral psychology article in philosophy compass 911 november 2014 with 149 reads how we measure reads.
Intuition and diversity volume 2 a bradford book 9780262693578. Three studies were conducted to test the role of the dehumanization of refugees through claims that they are immoral in determining emotional reactions to refugees, attitudes toward refugees, and attitudes toward current refugee policy in canada. Dehumanization may also lead people to ignore others, or to treat others as they would children, considering them agents worthy of moral care but denying them. From dehumanization to rehumanization carnegie council for. Oct 24, 2010 buy humiliation, degradation, dehumanization. The oppressed cannot be liberated by slogans, by propaganda passed down to them from a wellmeaning elite. If others are understood as fully human then we feel bound to consider and care about their interests, prevent or alleviate their suffering, and experience moral emotions when we have wronged them staub, this volume. Contemporary moral psychologythe study of human thought and. Dehumanization, essentialism, and moral psychology smith 2014. These findings will be useful to dehumanization and anthropomorphism researchers. Dehumanization refers to the tendency to regard members of some groups as less human, and thus, as less worthy of humane treatment, than members of other groups.
Moral action and moral judgment seem to depend on an appreciation of the humanness of others. One factor that may promote the dehumanization of refugees is the portrayal of refugees by popular media. Across two studies we show that engaging in violent video game play diminishes perceptions of our own human qualities. Social connection enables dehumanization sciencedirect. People who are experiencing dehumanization are perceived to be separate, unequal, and distant from actual humans. Humanness, dehumanization, and moral psychology nick haslam university of melbourne brock bastian university of queensland simon laham university of melbourne stephen loughnan university of kent in principle, all of us have moral worth and deserve moral treatment simply by virtue of being human. Dehumanization, essentialism, and moral psychology request pdf. Fifth, we examine the consequences of dehumanization, emphasizing its implications for prosocial and antisocial behavior and for moral judgment. Human dignity violated library of ethics and applied philosophy 2011 by paulus kaufmann, hannes kuch, christian neuhaeuser isbn. In the last decades, social psychology has ceased to study dehumanization simply as an. Pdf humanness, dehumanization, and moral psychology brock. This work has been at least partly inspired by a new model of dehumanization that our group has developed, which derives from a framework for understanding humanness in social perception and judgment. In this paper, i use it to denote the psychological stance of conceiving of other human beings as subhuman creatures.
Dehumanization is the loss of human qualities and attributes that make a person or group of people appear to be human beings. A natural history of human morality by michael tomasello. Dehumanization is defined as a psychological process whereby members of a group of people assert the inferiority of another group. From the above analysis, we can distill two linked aspects of dehumanization. His research has been published in the top social psychology journals including the journal of personality and social psychology and personality and social psychology bulletin. Humanness, dehumanization, and moral psychology nick haslam university of melbourne brock bastian university of queensland simon. Dehumanization is a term that is used to denote a psychological process where ones opponent is viewed as less than human and not deserving of moral and legal consideration.
Jews in the eyes of nazis and tutsis in the eyes of hutus in the rwandan genocide are but two examples. Discusses a current trend toward a dehumanization of mankind through technological development and violence, examines the devitalization of society, personality, culture, and politics, and explains how to combat such evolution. If you want to see what all the excitement is about, this book is a great place to start. The behaviors were sampled from a variety of books on animal. Subhuman takes an interdisciplinary approach to these questions, drawing from research in philosophy, neuroscience, psychology, law, history, sociology, economics, and anthropology. The dehumanization of art, and other writings on art and culture doubleday anchor book, a72 by jose ortega y gasset and a great selection of related books, art and collectibles available now at. For the most part ashley montagu and floyd matson are right on the money in my opinion for denouncing the postindustrial masscommunications age as an increasingly barbaric and uncivilized time and they give numerous examples that attest to this view. Dehumanization, torture, and christianity atheist revolution. This book provides an account of the moral psychology behind our attitudes to. But you didnt say anything about the descriptive content of dehumanization. Board of governors professor of philosophy and cognitive. Most hold that this is explained by the fact that dehumanization causes people to become morally disengaged from those whom they abuse.
Apr 07, 20 psychology definition of dehumanization. Fourth, we explore when people dehumanize, focusing on transient situational and motivational factors that promote dehumanizing perceptions. The impact of mechanistic and animalistic dehumanization on the perception of african american and european american women myrianna bakou, dr. Pdf humanness, dehumanization, and moral psychology. Dehumanization may be carried out by a social institution such as a state, school, or family, interpersonally, or even within the self.
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