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38 - The Accidental Social Psychologist

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 September 2022

By
Brenda Major
Edited by
Saul Kassin
Saul Kassin
Affiliation:
John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York
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Summary

I am honored to be included in this book among so many social psychologists whose work I respect and admire. At the risk of confirming the gender differences in attributions that Kay Deaux identified long ago – that “what is skill for the male is luck for the female” (Deaux & Emswiller, 1974) – I also feel incredibly lucky to be included here. I am, as I often tell my students, an “accidental social psychologist.” Due to several strokes of good fortune, including having a supportive undergraduate mentor at the College of Wooster, who thought of me when he got notice of a last-minute opening in a PhD program due to an illness, and being in the right place at the right time with not much else to do, I managed to get into the PhD program in experimental psychology at Miami University of Ohio without going through the traditional graduate application process. There, I took two courses in social psychology, one from Richard Sherman on attribution processes, and another on the psychology of freedom and control from Art Miller, that changed the course of my life and my area of study. Those two courses hooked me on social psychology.

Type
Chapter
Information
Pillars of Social Psychology
Stories and Retrospectives
 , pp. 326 - 332
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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References

Suggested Reading

Crocker, J., & Major, B. (1989). Social stigma and self-esteem: The self-protective properties of stigma. Psychological Review, 96, 608–630.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crocker, J., Voelkl, K., Testa, M., & Major, B. (1991). Social stigma: The affective consequences of attributional ambiguity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60, 218–228.Google Scholar
Deaux, K., & Emswiller, T. (1974). Explanations of successful performance on sex-linked tasks: What is skill for the male is luck for the female. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 29(1), 80–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deaux, K., & Major, B. (1987). Putting gender into context: An interactive model of gender-related behavior. Psychological Review, 94, 369–389.Google Scholar
Dover, T. L., Major, B., & Glace, A. M. (2020). Discrimination, health, and the costs and benefits of believing in system fairness. Health Psychology, 39(3), 230–239.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kaiser, C. R., Major, B., Jurcevic, I., Dover, T., Brady, L. M., & Shapiro, J. R. (2013). Presumed fair: Ironic effects of organizational diversity structures. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 104(3), 504–519.Google Scholar
Major, B. (1994). From social inequality to personal entitlement: The role of social comparisons, legitimacy appraisals, and group membership. In Zanna, M. (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology (Vol. 26, pp. 293–355). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Major, B., Blodorn, A., & Major Blascovich, G. (2018). The threat of increasing diversity: Why many White Americans support Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 21(6), 931–940.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Major, B., Gramzow, R., McCoy, S., Levin, S., Schmader, T., & Sidanius, J. (2002). Perceiving personal discrimination: The role of group status and legitimizing ideology. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82, 269–282.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Major, B., & Kaiser, C. R. (2017). Ideology and the maintenance of group inequality. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, 20, 582–592.Google Scholar
Major, B., Kaiser, C. R., O’Brien, L., & McCoy, S. (2007). Perceived discrimination as worldview threat or worldview confirmation: Implications for self-esteem. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92, 1068–1086.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Major, B., Kunstman, J. W., Malta, B. D., Sawyer, P. J., Townsend, S. S., & Mendes, W. B. (2016). Suspicion of motives predicts minorities’ responses to positive feedback in interracial interactions. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 62, 75–88.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Major, B., Rathbone, J. A., Blodorn, A., & Hunger, J. M. (2020). The countervailing effects of weight stigma on weight loss motivation and perceived capacity for weight control. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 46(9), 1331–1343.Google Scholar
Major, B., Quinton, W., & McCoy, S. (2002). Antecedents and consequences of attributions to discrimination: Theoretical and empirical advances. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 34, 251–330.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Townsend, S. S. M., Major, B., Sawyer, P. J., & Mendes, W. B. (2010). Can the absence of prejudice be more threatening than its presence? It depends on one’s worldview. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 99, 933–947.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

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