Human nature is prone to the in-group associations which results in prejudgment and formation of mainly hostile attitudes based on limited information a situation known as prejudice.
As a result, prejudice leads to the development of stereotypes, discriminatory behavior, and even bullying which are the basic aspects of conflict development. Consequently, this discussion focuses on conflict as a result of prejudice, with the argument that creating better understanding and empathy among people reduces cases of prejudice.\u00a0
Reflection
The reasoning that women on social welfare have it made as other labor with taxes reflects prejudice and hostile attitudes towards those people who depend on welfare for livelihoods. Arguments about paying taxes while the mentioned women only receive incomes reflects on the group conflict due to limited resources as expressed in realistic conflict theory. Furthermore, the arguments reflect an aspect of attributional bias where the victims of prejudice (welfare women) are blamed for the development of prejudices behavior where in this case, high taxes.
Strategy 1: Contact Hypothesis
\u00a0To bridge the rift between the group of people who feel that prejudice women have a simple life and welfare-dependent women, there is need to establish contact and links between the two groups. As a result, the contact between the two groups helps create understanding as to why the prejudiced group depends on welfare. Furthermore, the establishment of contact promotes the development of common goals between the two groups such as improvement of living conditions which reduces the instances of prejudice.
Strategy 2: Cooperation
This strategy proposes the development of joint activities in order to induce cooperation between the two rival groups. The joint behavior leads to helpfulness between the groups where they benefit from one another. In the case of prejudiced welfare-dependent women, the other group can offer them casual employment such as babysitting. The women will benefit from earning incomes while members of the accusing group will benefit from their services.
Conclusion
Prejudice results from misunderstanding and leads to a discord in the society and may be caused by limited resources. However, establishing contact and cooperation between groups results in better understanding among the groups. The rationale for the application of the two strategies is that providing common ground and goals aids in the creation of a cohesive culture that limits conflicts between divergent groups.\u00a0
References
Paluck, E. L., " Green, D. P. (2009). Prejudice reduction: What works? A review and assessment of research and practice. Annual review of psychology, 60, 339-367. http://legacy.cscc.edu/about/faculty/pd/files/Paluck%20-%20Prejudice%20Reduction.pdf
Pettigrew, T. F., Tropp, L. R., Wagner, U., " Christ, O. (2011). Recent advances in intergroup contact theory. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 35(3), 271-280. https://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/45117961/Recent_advances_in_intergroup_contact_th20160426-14669-1kxmxqi.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAIWOWYYGZ2Y53UL3A"Expires=1519606220"Signature=xIno4jRsNCkH7R8PZrw9a7YzT%2Bc%3D"response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3DRecent_advances_in_intergroup_contact_th.pdf
Zarate, M. A., Garcia, B., Garza, A. A., " Hitlan, R. T. (2004). Cultural threat and perceived realistic group conflict as dual predictors of prejudice. Journal of experimental social psychology, 40(1), 99-105. https://uni.edu/~hitlan/culturalthreat.pdf
