TRUTH WITHIN FICTION: The Relationship between Stories and Outgroup Prejudice

Abstract

A considerable body of research has demonstrated that after reading a story about a marginalized group, people exhibit less prejudice towards members of that group. Because narratives have the ability to suspend our disbelief, transport us into the world of the story, and connect us to the protagonist, they hold promise as an effective tool for prejudice reduction. However, there have been few investigations into the long-term effects of this finding. The following studies seek to examine whether a lifetime of reading stories about racial outgroup members predicts generally lower prejudice towards that outgroup. In Study 1, we develop and validate a scale (the RART) that can be used to measure an individual’s reading practices with regards to the race of characters that they typically read about. In Study 2, we examine the relationship between participants’ reading practices and their anti-Black prejudice. We also examine whether Theory of Mind might constitute a mediating variable in this relationship. The results indicate that people who read more books about Black characters hold lower levels of anti-Black bias, both implicitly and explicitly, but that Theory of Mind does not mediate this connection. Future work may seek to examine whether a causal long-term relationship exists between reading stories about outgroup members and prejudice reduction towards those outgroups.