2003/01/01 by Brenda Major, Shannon K. McCoy, Shannon McCoy +4 · 75 citations
Psychology · Social Sciences · #Attachment and Relationship Dynamics #CLARITY #Cultural Differences and Values #Optimism #Perception #Prejudice (legal term) #Psychology #Self-esteem #Situational ethics #Social and Intergroup Psychology #Social psychology
paper · doi:10.1080/10463280340000027
published in European Review of Social Psychology 14(1), 77-104 (Taylor & Francis)
openalex publication_date 2003/01/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
This paper reviews three theoretical models of how prejudice affects the self-esteem of its targets. The stimulus-response model assumes that prejudice has a direct, negative effect on self-esteem. The stimulus-perception-response model recognises that perceptions of prejudice may not directly mirror experiences with prejudice, but predicts that the subjective perception of being a target of prejudice has a direct, negative effect on self-esteem. Both of these models are found to be inadequate. We propose a third, transactional model, which assumes that individuals do not respond in uniform way to being the target of prejudice. Rather, this model contends that self-esteem and emotional responses to prejudice are determined by cognitive appraisals of prejudicial events and coping strategies used in response to these events; these processes, in turn, are shaped by personal, situational, and structural factors. Experiments are presented showing that self-esteem in response to perceived prejudice is moderated by presence or absence of threats to personal identity, clarity of prejudices cues in the situation, ingroup identification, dispositional optimism, endorsement of legitimising ideologies, and group status. We argue that a transactional model of responses to prejudice emphasises sources of resistance as well as vulnerability among targets of prejudice.