This study’s approach does not deny that some such factors (specifically excepting the first and third listed) may, singly or in combination, operate as factors in determining the course of intergroup relations. “National character,” frustrations suffered in common and experienced as a common issue, certain economic gains that become shared goals, or the particular character of the group’s leadership may variously become the more weighty determinant of intergroup relations under a given set of circumstances.2
But conflicting evidence leads us to assert that the weighty factor determining intergroup relations will not be the same for all circumstances. For example, in settled times when ingroups are in a state of greater stability, national character as formed at the time and the existing scale of social distance (or prejudice) will regulate, on the whole, the particular pattern of intergroup relations. But in times of greater flux or crises (due to the impact of technological, cultural, socioeconomic, and even military events) some other factor or factors take the upper hand.
One primary point of departure in our approach, then, is the principle that various factors are functionally interrelated. In this respect our approach opposes theories that make this or that factor sovereign in its own right; this approach attempts, rather, to ascertain the relative weights of all the possible factors that may be operative at the time.
The functional relatedness of various factors leads us to the cardinal psychological principle of our whole plan of study: in the study of intra- and intergroup relations, the relative contribution of given external stimulus factors and internal factors pertaining to participating individuals (hunger, sex, status desire, complexes, etc.) have to be analyzed within the framework of the ongoing interaction process among the members in question.
The relative contribution of an external stimulus factor, or of an attitude, a drive, or other internal factors, cannot be simply extrapolated from individual situations to interaction situations. Interaction processes are not voids. Whatever drives, motives, or attitudes the individual brings into the situation operate as deflected, modified, and at times, transformed in the interaction process among the several individuals, who stand, or come to stand in time, in definite role relations toward one another.
The application of this cardinal principle to the study of group relations is derived from more basic findings in the field of judgment and perception. The judgment of a given weight is not determined solely by its absolute value, but also, within limits, by its relative position in the scale of which it is a part and by the presence or absence of other functionally related anchoring stimuli with values within and outside the scale. Likewise, placement of attitudinal items on a scale with categories specified by the experimenter or chosen by the subject is determined not only by whatever intrinsic value these items may have when considered singly, but also by their relation to one another and to the stand that the individual has taken on the issue.
Following the implications of this general psychological principle, it may be plausible to state that behavior revealing discriminations, perceptions, and evaluations of individuals participating in the interaction process as group members will be determined not only by whatever motivational components and personality characteristics each member brings with him and not only by the properties of stimulus conditions specified in an unrelated way. Rather, such behavior will take shape as influenced, modified, and even transformed interdependently by these factors and the special properties of the interaction process, in which a developing or established state of reciprocities (roles, statuses) plays no small part. The developing state of reciprocities between individual members can be measured in various differentiated dimensions (e.g., status, popularity, initiative, etc.).
In short, one cannot directly extrapolate from the knowledge of stimulus conditions alone or of motivational components of participating individuals alone. One has to study behavior in the framework of the actual interaction process, with its developing reciprocities.
Carrying this line of conceptualization to the area of intergroup relations, one should start with the recognition that the area of interaction between groups cannot be directly extrapolated from the nature of relations within groups or from prevailing practices within them, even though a careful analysis of intragroup relations is an essential prerequisite in any approach to intergroup relations. We could mention numerous instances of intergroup relations in which the pattern (positive or negative) is different from the pattern prevailing within the respective ingroups.
Thus, in addition to studying relations prevailing within the ingroups in question, one has to study the interaction process between groups and its consequences in their own right.
The conceptual orientation just outlined determined, first, the formulation of specific hypotheses; second, the design of the experiment through three successive stages; third, in selecting the subjects and choosing the setting, the choice of criteria that would not permit the direct intrusion of influences other than those experimentally introduced; and fourth, the special considerations related to observational and experimental techniques to be used in the collection of data, and the specific roles staff members would occupy.
Methodological Considerations
The problem of intergroup relations has not been the domain of experimentation. Literally, only a few studies have been specifically designed to experiment on intergroup relations. Therefore, the present study undertakes to define main functional relations involved in the problem and to point, on the basis of data obtained, to some unmistakable trends.
The experimental study of intergroup relations requires that various conditions between groups be experimentally introduced and manipulated; the nature of these conditions should be defined and the consequences of their variation predicted.
Recent research in both psychology and sociology and indications of attempts by practitioners in this area are making it increasingly evident that theoretical and practical problems of group relations have to be studied in terms of the interaction processes within and between appropriate group settings. This observation includes the study of attitudes and change of attitudes that regulate the behavior of individuals within their respective ingroups and in relations with outgroups.
The usual practice in attitude studies has been to study the effects of already existing attitudes or to measure attitudes that are already formed. When carried out apart from particular group settings, the study of motives (drives), frustrations, past experience, and similar factors (which certainly operate in the formation, functioning, and change of social attitudes pertaining to group relations) has given us items of information whose validity has not been proven in actual issues of group relations. The attempt in this study is to trace the formation, functioning, and change of attitudes toward one’s own group, toward its various members, and toward outgroups and their members as these attitudes develop within the setting of group interaction processes and as consequences thereof.
The study’s method was to experimentally produce ingroups themselves and the attitudes of members toward one another and toward the ingroup as a whole. In other words, group attitudes (both intra- and intergroup) were to start from scratch and to be produced as a consequence of interaction processes in intra- and intergroup relations through the introduction of specified experimental conditions. We need not elaborate on the methodological gain from experimentally producing attitudes whose effects or change are to be studied or measured.
Considerations such as those briefly mentioned above determined the approach taken, the specific hypotheses formulated, and the design of the experiment in three successive stages. Likewise, they determined the choice of particular methods and cautions to be pursued in the collection of data.
To approximate as much as possible the natural process of spontaneous group formation—of ingroup and outgroup delineation with its consequences so abundantly reported in the literature on small groups—subjects were kept unaware that this was an experiment on intergroup relations. (See “Subject Selection” in the next