Dutch Scientists Link Chaotic Environments to Stereotyping UPDATED

UDPATE November 2011: The University of Tilburg has dismissed Diederik Stapel after he admitted to falsifying data used in dozens of studies. More on Stapel’s falsified data can be found here. The study that this article was based upon has since fallen into question. -Ed.

Dutch scientists Siegwart Lindenberg and Diederik Stapel of Tilburg University believe they have found a link between a chaotic, disordered environment and embracing stereotypes. Their theory was that stereotypes are a way of coping with uncertainty, and that in disorganized environments people would move toward more stark, simplified thinking.

Across five different experiments, the scientists asked their volunteer subjects a series of questions about the personality traits of Dutch, homosexual, and Muslim people while in a chaotic environment. The experimenters would then perform the same test again, but this time in a calmer setting, and compare the results.

The lengths the researchers went to set up these enviroments is impressive in and of itself. For their first experiment, they interviewed volunteers in a train station where the cleaning staff were on strike, and garbage had began to pile up. They later returned after the strike had ended, and the station was clean. For the second experiment, the duo pulled up paving tiles, parked a car askew, and generally disordered a street in an upscale neighborhood. The next day, they ran the same experiment, with the street neat and tidy as it usually is.

In both of these experiments, respondents were more likely to choose stereotyped answers in the chaotic environment, than the calm one. From Discover:

For example, they were more likely to rate Muslims as being ‘loyal’ and ‘aggressive’, gay people as ‘sweet’ and ‘feminine’, and Dutch people as ‘tolerant’ and ‘stingy’.

The researchers also looked at the behavior of their volunteers, in order to control for liars amongst those that responded. In the train station experiment, the volunteers were sat at a row of chairs while they recorded their answers. But in some cases either a black or white person working with the researchers would already be seated at one end. In the disordered environment, the all-white volunteer pool sat three chairs away from the black research associate, but all volunteers sat two seats away from the white associate — regardless of environment.

Similarly, when asked to donate to a fictitious charity called “Money for Minorities” in the different neighborhood settings, responders gave less in the chaotic surroundings than in the nice one.

Taking their work inside the lab, the scientists devised more abstract needs to see if people will crave stability in a chaotic environment. Remember, the scientists believe that the stereotypes spring from a desire for stability, and not simply a messy backdrop. For these experiments, subjects were shown pictures of tidy and messy bookshelves; shapes on a grid and shapes tossed about at random; and even flashed trigger words like “chaos” or “calm” at the subjects peripheral vision where they could not be read.In these final three tests, the subjects responded similarly as they had during the environmental experiments. Simply looking at images that suggested disorder was enough to bring out more stereotyped results.

These findings fit in well with the so-called Broken Windows theory, which postulates that even small signs of societal disorder such as broken windows can lead to crime and other problems in an area. And like how tough enforcement of minor laws against cosmetic infractions can help reduce crime in a city, this study suggests that improving an environment can make people happier and more harmonious. Since simplified, stereotypical thinking is, apparently, part of how we are hard-wired as humans, it’s a relief that some good could possibly come from understanding why humans think that way.

(via Discover)