Stereotypical Thinking 刻板思维 Prejudicial thinking is characterized by certain specific qualities. The stereotype is an oversimplified attitude or belief about some category of experience which allows us to justify our action in respect to that category. The utility of stereotypes is that they simplify the thought process involvedin dealing with strange, different, or little understood aspects of reality, and provide a means of rationalization for felt emotional responses. Closely linked to stereotypical thinking is a tendency toward classification on the basis of insufficient evidence. It should be noted that this is not an exclusive character of prejudicial thinking, since the tendency to organize our experience and to group it in various classifications, particularly evaluative classifications of good and bad objects, on the basis of minimal amounts of information, is not altogether uncommon(Brigham,1971; Cauthen et al., 1971). 偏见思维具有一定的特殊性。刻板印象是对某类经验的一种过于简单化的态度或信念，它使我们能够为自己在这类经验上的行为辩护。刻板印象的作用在于，它简化了涉及处理现实中奇怪、不同或鲜为人知的方面的思维过程，并为感受到的情感反应提供了合理化的手段。与刻板思维密切相关的是一种倾向，即在证据不足的基础上进行分类。应该注意的是,这不是偏见思维的独有特征,因为组织我们的经验并把它们分在在不同的分类中的趋向(特别是根据少量的信息评价好的和坏的对象的分类)不是完全罕见的(布里格姆,1971;Cauthen等，1971)。 The effort to assure one's self of adequacy of evidence, to assess the quality of evidence, to verify and validate the applicability and veracity of forms of classification, is a work that is carried on by scholars and scientists, not by common people. The human mind is quick to judge and classify objects of its experience, particularly when practical demands for decision and action are exerting an influence. Even scientific knowledge, when it is pressed into application, must often be applied without sufficient evidence. The art and practice of medicine is such an application. The physician is often in the position of having to decide upon a course of action or treatment without sufficient evidence to guarantee the presumptive diagnosis. 努力确保自己的证据充足，评估证据的质量，确认和验证分类形式的适用性和准确性，是学者和科学家而不是普通人进行的工作。人类的大脑能够快速地对其经历的对象进行判断和分类，尤其是当对决策和行动的实际需求产生影响时。即使是科学知识，当它被强行应用时，往往也必须在没有充分证据的情况下加以应用。医学的艺术和实践就是这样一种应用。医生经常处于这样一种境地:在没有足够的证据来保证作出假定诊断的情况下，必须决定采取何种行动或进行何种治疗。 The process of stereotypical thinking has been analyzed into cognitive operations of categorization, assimilation, and search for coherence(Tajfel, 1969). Discrete categorizations of continuous dimensions—particularly in complex judgments of social realities—introduce simplifications and exaggerations which are resistant to contrary evidence. Assimilation refers to the complex process by which the content of the categories, to which individuals are assigned by reason of their social identity within a culture, is generated. Assimilation of social values and norms provides the content of intergroup attitudes—both within the group and toward outgroups. To these cognitive processes is added the search for coherence which brings organization to the understanding of social flux. Tajfel writes: 刻板思维的过程被分析为分类、同化和寻找连贯性的认知操作(Tajfel, 1969)。连续维度的离散分类——尤其是在对社会现实的复杂判断中——引入了简化和夸大，而这些简化和夸大对相反的证据是无效的。同化是指范畴的内容产生的复杂过程，个体因其在文化中的社会身份而被赋予范畴的内容。社会价值观和规范的同化提供了群体内部和外部群体之间态度的内容。在这些认知过程中，还加入了对连贯性的探索，这将组织带到对社会变迁的理解中。Tajfel写道: If the individual is to adjust to the flux of social changes, he must attempt to understand it. In other words in order to deal with change an individual must make constant causal attributions about the processes responsible for it, and these attributions must fulfill at least two criteria: they must equip him to deal with new situations in a manner which appears consistent to him, and they must do this in a way which will preserve, as far as possible, his self-image or integrity.... One of the most important classes of events within the stream of constant social change arises directly from the fact that an individual is a member of numerous social groups that interact with other groups. Theoretically, two types of change(and consequently, of the need for cognitive adjustment to change) can be distinguished: intragroup and intergroup. The former consists of the individual's changing circumstances within the group or groups to which he belongs; the latter, of those aspects of the changing relations of his group with other groups which affect directly some important aspects of his life. In both cases, he needs to build a cognitive structure which provides him with a satisfactory explanation of the causes of change. A "satisfactory"explanation will manage to preserve personal integrity while at the same time—for reasons of cognitive economy—it will tend towards as much simplification as the situation allows for. 如果一个人要适应社会变化的变化，他必须努力去理解它。换句话说,为了应对变化个体必须对造成变化的过程进行不断的因果归因,而这些归因必须完成至少两个标准:他们必须武装他来处理新情况，用一种对他来说一致的方式,他们必须用一种可以尽可能保护他的自我形象或正直性的方式进行....在不断变化的社会潮流中，最重要的一类事件直接产生于这样一个事实:一个人是与其他群体互动的众多社会群体中的一员。从理论上讲，可以区分两种类型的变化(因此，对变化进程认知调整的需求):群体内和群体间。前者是指个体在其所属的群体中所处的不断变化的环境;后者指的是直接影响到他生活的一些重要方面的他的群体与其他群体之间关系的变化。在这两种情况下，他都需要建立一个认知结构，为他提供一个令人满意的改变原因的解释。一个“令人满意的”解释将设法保持个人的完整性，同时——出于认知经济学的原因——它将趋向于尽可能地简化情况。 As we shall see later in this study, when we consider aspects of the mechanisms employed in the paranoid process, these cognitive operations of categorization, assimilation, and the tendency toward coherence form part of the cognitive process which we shall refer to as the paranoid construction. It is important at this point to note that the paranoid construction is intimately related to the cognitive organization of prejudicial attitudes as well as to the integration of an understanding of group coherence—and, not incidentally, to the cognitive integration of personal identity. 我们将在本研究的后面看到，当我们考虑偏执狂过程中使用的机制的各个方面时，这些分类、同化和一致性的认知操作构成了我们称之为偏执建构的认知过程的一部分。在这一点上，重要的是要注意到偏执的建构与偏见态度的认知组织密切相关，也与对群体一致性的理解的整合密切相关——而且，并非偶然地，与个人身份的认知整合也密切相关。 The prejudiced mind, however, employs stereotypes and tends toward biased classification as a result of inner emotional needs and pressures. Consequently its thinking is marked by a premature closure, which functions not merely in the face of an absence of evidence, but which reaches overly simplified and premature conclusions in the face of available evidences to the contrary. The pressure to categorize prematurely thus seems to be unconsciously motivated and seems to serve defensive functions. 然而，由于内在的情感需求和压力，偏见的心灵使用刻板印象，并倾向于有偏见的分类。因此，其思想的特点是过早地封闭，它不仅在缺乏证据的情况下起作用，而且在现有证据相反的情况下得出过分简化和过早的结论。因此，过早进行分类的压力似乎是无意识的，而且似乎具有防御功能。 As a result of this premature classification and premature closure, prejudicial thinking is marked by overgeneralization. Isolated pieces of evidence, which would support the formulation of the prejudice, are taken as having general validity and are presented as a basis for general conclusions about the object of prejudice. Other pieces of evidence, which would counterbalance the prejudice, are rejected as irrelevant or unimportant. Thus there is a radical selectivity which assimilates to the prejudicial category any evidence that would be consistent or supportive of it and eliminates from consideration any evidence that would be contrary. 由于这种过早的分类和过早的封闭，偏见思维具有过度概括的特征。将支持偏见的形成的孤立证据视为具有普遍效力，并作为关于偏见对象的一般性结论的基础提出。其他可以抵消这种偏见的证据被认为是无关紧要或不重要的而被拒绝。因此，存在一种激进的选择性，它把任何与它一致或支持它的证据吸收进偏见分类，而把任何相反证据排除在考虑之外。