Race Affects How We Learn to Fear Others, Study Says

Race Affects How We Learn to Fear Others, Study Says
Stefan Lovgrenfor National Geographic News
July 28, 2005People have more difficulty getting over fear toward members of other races than toward those of their own race, a new study shows.
In the study, blacks and whites were shown images of both black and white men and given a mildly uncomfortable electric shock.
The participants were later shown the same images, this time without the shock. Researchers found that the participants dropped the fear they associated with people of their own race but continued to show fear of members of the other race.
The results suggest that how we learn fear is influenced by what social group we belong to.
"We'll more readily associate somebody of a group that's not our own with something negative, and that fear isn't changed by new information as readily as [it is] with somebody in our own social group," said Liz Phelps, a professor of psychology and neural science at New York University and a co-author of the study.
Phelps and colleagues say that the persistence of fear toward members of another race is a product of both evolutionary factors and cultural learning.


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