APPLIED SOCIAL PSYCHOLOG

SOCIAL INTERVENTIONS TO MODERATE DISCRIMINATORY ATTITUDES: THE CASE OF THE

PHYSICALLY CHALLENGED IN INDIA

SEMON SAINI
ROLL NO- 221347
SUBMITTED TO – DR. VIBHUTI MEHTA
Disability attitudes are major barriers in improving the living conditions of physically
challenged people in developing countries. Studies have shown that people generally harbor
negative and paternalistic attitudes toward persons with disabilities. Myths, legends,
scriptures and folklore are all part of the cultural belief system that shapes such attitudes. The
physically challenged frequently suffer more due to societal prejudices than due to their
disabling physical conditions. The social and physical environment in which this physically
challenged life is often designed without much consideration of their special needs. Social
interventions aimed at changing the disability attitudes of rural people in India are discussed.
As part of a community-based rehabilitation program, the main thrust of these interventions
was to shift the attention of local communities from disabilities to abilities of the physically
challenged.
In health and medicine, attitudes towards disability are defined as the cognitive and
behavioural processes that involve judgement and favourable/unfavourable reactions to
aspects of disability.
Disability results from the interaction between individuals with a health condition, such as
cerebral palsy, Down syndrome and depression, with personal and environmental factors
including negative attitudes, inaccessible transportation and public buildings, and limited
social support.
A person’s environment has a huge effect on the experience and extent of disability.
Inaccessible environments create barriers that often hinder the full and effective participation
of persons with disabilities in society on an equal basis with others. Progress on improving
social participation can be made by addressing these barriers and facilitating persons with
disabilities in their day to day lives. A physical disability is a limitation on a person's physical
functioning, mobility, dexterity or stamina. Other physical disabilities include impairments
which limit other facets of daily living, such as respiratory
disorders, blindness, epilepsy and sleep disorders.
The aim of community-based rehabilitation (CBR) is to help people with disabilities, by
establishing community-based medical integration, equalization of opportunities,
and Physical therapy (Physiotherapy) rehabilitation programs for disabled people. The
strength of CBR programs is that they can be made available in rural areas, with limited
infrastructure, as program leadership is not restricted to professionals in healthcare,
education, physiotherapy, occupational therapy vocational or social services. CBR programs
involve the people with disabilities themselves, their families and communities, as well as
appropriate professionals. Some are doing their own work.
The term “social stigma” is not very popular in the disability sector because of the potential
stereotyping it may cause to the word disability. Hence the rehabilitation programs emphasize
bringing about change in attitudes, moderate prejudices and stereotypes. An attitude is a
relatively enduring organisation of beliefs, feelings and behavioural tendencies towards
socially significant objects, groups, events or symbols and a general feeling or evaluation –
positive or negative – about some person, object or issue. Prejudice is an assumption or an
opinion about someone simply based on that person's membership to a particular group. For
example, people can be prejudiced against someone else of a different ethnicity, gender, or
religion. A stereotype is a fixed, over-generalized belief about a particular group or class of
people. By stereotyping, we infer that a person has a whole range of characteristics and
abilities that we assume all members of that group have. So that people have a positive
attitude towards physically challenged people and they reduce their prejudice and do not
stereotype physically challenged people.
Attitudes towards disability is changing from negative, stigmatizing and rejecting attitudes
through pity and compassion towards willingness to accept physically challenged persons on
equal terms.
Our stereotypes and our prejudices are problematic because they create discrimination —
negative behaviours toward members of outgroups based on their group membership which
are absolutely not justified. Discrimination is a major societal problem because it is so
pervasive, takes so many forms, and has such negative effects on so many people. Even
people who are paid to be unbiased may discriminate. You may have had some experiences
where you found yourself responding to another person on the basis of a stereotype or
prejudice. Perhaps you then tried to get past these beliefs and to react to the person more on
the basis of his or her individual characteristics. We like some people and we dislike others
— this is quite natural — but we should not let a person’s skin color, gender, age, religion,
sexual orientation, ethnic background, or disability make these determinations for us.
Wright (1964) found that a negative evaluation of the condition of disability spreads to
influence the evaluation of other non-impaired characteristics. Such spread effect—the power
of single characteristic to evoke inferences about a person—was demonstrated in many
studies (Hewstone, 1994). These studies evidenced that the term ‘‘disability’’ can evoke
many responses about various presumed dispositions of a person with disability. These
responses are not casual; they indicate the respondent’s generalized views about disability.
People generalize from the physical characteristic to affective and behavioural characteristics.
Such stereotypes could be coherent and fit in people’s own naive theories. These are based on
culture-specific popular misconceptions amplified by literature, poetry, paintings, music, and
so on. Wright (1983) has stated that because of the spread, the degree of disability is often
perceived as more severe and disabling than it actually is. People discriminate among the
physically challenged individuals.

People undergo shifts in their attitudes in the process of integrating their life experiences.
Social psychologists have long been interested in the process that propels people to change
their attitudes in a positive direction. Many theories and techniques of attitude change are
propounded and a large body of research is generated to test the efficacy of these theories and
techniques. Many social psychology textbooks define attitudes in terms of their three
components: beliefs (evaluation), affects (feelings) and behaviour tendencies.
The attitude where all three components are congruent is difficult to change, whereas
attitudes with incongruent components are more amenable to change.
The consistency theory with the clearest implications for attitude structure is Fritz Heider’s
balance theory (Heider, 1946; also see Cartwright & Harary, 1956). Heider’s ideas were
grounded in Gestalt psychology, an approach to perception popular in Germany in the early
twentieth century and applied by Heider to interpersonal relations. Gestalt psychologists
believed that the human mind is a person’s ‘cognitive field’, and it comprises interacting
forces that are associated with people’s perceptions of people, objects and events. Balance
theory focuses on the P–O–X unit of the individual’s cognitive field. Imagine a triad
consisting of three elements: a person (P), another person (O), and an attitude, object or topic
(X). A triad is consistent if it is balanced, and balance is assessed by counting the number and
types of relationships between the elements. For instance, P liking X is a positive ( + )
relationship, O disliking X is negative ( − ), and P disliking O is negative ( − ). Unbalanced
structures are usually less stable and more unpleasant than balanced structures. However, in
the absence of contradictory information, people assume that others will like what they
themselves like. Further, we often prefer to agree with someone else or in balance-theory
language, P and O seek structures where they agree rather than disagree about how they
evaluate X. Again, people do not always seek to resolve inconsistency. Sometimes they
organise their beliefs so that elements are kept isolated and are resistant to change. For
example, if P likes opera and O does not, and if P and O like each other, P may decide to
isolate the element of opera from the triad by listening to opera when O is not present.
If the attitudes towards physically disabled is congruent in the negative direction, then it will
become difficult to change the attitude.
In 1957 Leon Festinger published his theory of cognitive dissonance. Like balance theorv, the
focus of cognitive dissonance theory is on individuals, who are assumed to strive for
harmony or consonance among the elements in their cognitive, or thought, structures. The
creation of dissonance, similar to the creation of imbalance is thought to be distressful and to
motivate the person to restore consonance. The creation of dissonance, however, can occur
under a wider set of circumstances than can the creation of imbalance. For Festinger, any two
related cognitive elements will be dissonant if they do not fit together because they violate
general logic or the person's expectations. It is consonant to favor candidate X and to give
public support to his candidacy, but it is dissonant to favor X and to speak against him
publicly. Similarly the cognitive element "Smoking is a health hazard" is consonant with the
cognitive element "I do not smoke," but it is dissonant with being a smoker. The amount of
dissonance created depends upon the importance of the elements to the person and the extent
to which the elements do not fit. The magnitude of dissonance increases as the importance
and lack of fit becomes greater.
There are two major ways for a person to reduce dissonance:
1. to change one of the cognitive elements
2. to add a new cognitive element. The smoker who hears of the link between smoking
and health can stop smoking or can choose not to believe the link. If neither of these
changes in the cognitive element is made, the smoker may add a new element, such as
switching to filter cigarettes.
To reduce their feelings of inconsistency, people may have to seek out new or reinterpret old
information, realign or abandon cherished beliefs, or change patterns of behavior. People will
generally choose the easiest of these (the path of least resistance), which often means
changing their attitudes. Consistency theories have three parts:
• They specify the conditions that are required for consistency and inconsistency of
cognitions.
• They assume that inconsistency is unpleasant and therefore motivate people to restore
consistency.
• They specify the conditions that are needed to restore consistency.
If a person has a positive attitude towards physically challenged people but his social group
has negative attitude towards physically challenged people, then inconsistency is observed
between them. In this Bob is a person(P), his social group is the other person(O) and
physically challenged people are the attitudinal object(X).
Here he will have two choices either to change his social group who have positive attitude
towards physically challenged or the social group has to change their attitude towards
physically challenged people in order to retain the consistency in the attitudes.

Social categorization is a basic part of our human nature and one that helps us to simplify our
social worlds, to draw quick conclusions about others, and to feel good about ourselves. But
categorizing others may also lead to prejudice and discrimination, and it may even do so
without our awareness. Because prejudice and discrimination are so harmful to so many
people, we must all consciously work to get beyond them.
One variable that makes us less prejudiced is education. People who are more educated
express fewer stereotypes and prejudice in general. Another realm is Social Norms which
define what is appropriate and inappropriate, and we can effectively change stereotypes and
prejudice by changing the relevant norms about them. The influence of social norms is
powerful, and long-lasting changes in beliefs about outgroups will occur only if they are
supported by changes in social norms. Prejudice and discrimination thrive in environments in
which they are perceived to be the norm, but they die when the existing social norms do not
allow it. Discrimination, prejudice, and even hate crimes will be more likely to continue if
people do not respond to or confront them when they occur.
Confronting prejudice can lead other people to think that we are complaining and therefore to
dislike us, but confronting prejudice is not all negative for the person who confronts.
Changing our stereotypes and prejudices is not easy, and attempting to suppress them may
even backfire. However, with appropriate effort, we can reduce our tendency to rely on our
stereotypes and prejudices.

1. One approach to changing stereotypes and prejudice is by changing social norms—for

instance, through education and laws enforcing equality.
2. Prejudice will change faster when it is confronted by people who see it occurring.
Confronting prejudice may be embarrassing, but it also can make us feel that we have
done the right thing.
3. Intergroup attitudes will be improved when we can lead people to focus more on their
connections with others.
4. Respect a person’s choice to downplay or highlight their disability in particular
settings.
5. Don’t use negative words to describe disabilities. Words such as “tragedy” or
“suffering” can convey a stigmatizing view of disability. People are not “confined to
wheelchairs,” but rather use wheelchairs.
6. Develop concrete actions for students which can overcome prejudice and stigmatizing
attitudes more easily and are an important target group for long-term change in social
attitudes and behaviors.
7. Involve people with disabilities in the conception and implementation of any
campaign and intervention, in order to raise self-esteem and empowerment and to
challenge established social attitudes.
8. Disability is a complex experience that differs from person to person and changes
over time. Listen to them to discover how you can be their best ally.
9. Finally, we need to remember that we aren't short of good ideas, like reflecting upon
where we have been going wrong and how these wrongs can be undone. It's only the
stubborn inability to act upon and correctly implement the many good ideas that every
single one of us already possesses.
Disability need not be an obstacle to success. We have a moral duty to remove the barriers to
participation and to invest sufficient funding and expertise to unlock the vast potential of
people with disabilities. Governments throughout the world can no longer overlook the
hundreds of millions of people with disabilities who are denied access to health,
rehabilitation, support, education, and employment, and never get the chance to shine.