How can Prejudices and Discrimination be reduced?
In the Robber’s Cave experiment, Sherif and his colleges (1961, see also Tajfel et al., 1971; Rabbie & Horwitz, 1969) conducted an experiment with two groups of boys at a summer camp in the Robber’s Cave national park. In the first phase of the camp the randomly assigned groups formed fostered friendships and group unity in the group. During the second phase they successfully demonstrated that the boys developed even more hostility and prejudice towards the other group, when they had to compete in a series of sporting events for a scare resource (a 5$ price). After this phase both groups saw themselves as superior and referred to the other group as inferior and described them in negative attitudes. In the final phase of the camp, Sherif et al. tried to reduce the prejudice they produced between the groups during the competition, and even before when they first heard of each other. Firstly they decided to try to reduce the prejudice with Allport’s (1954) classic contact hypotheses and b
