Standing up for whom? Targets' different goals in the confrontation of discrimination

Abstract

We challenge the common interpretation of targets' immediate confrontation in reaction to discrimination as self-serving behavior and propose different underlying motivations for this phenomenon. In five online scenario studies (N-overall = 1,447), we demonstrate across different samples and contexts that targets indicate a distinct pursuit of the following self-reported confrontation goals: individual-benefit (e.g., perpetrator apologizes); group-benefit (e.g., prejudice reduction); and distancing (e.g., demonstrating that one is different from typical group members). Furthermore, meaningful associations of the pursuits of individual-benefitting goals and group-benefitting goals with group identification, disidentification, and further collective action intentions indicate that they represent different confrontation motivations: Individual-benefitting confrontation serves to cope with the individual mistreatment of discrimination, whereas group-benefitting confrontation represents a form of collective action. Distancing goals were associated with disidentification and-unexpectedly-group identification. Our results show that the phenomenon of confrontation in reaction to discrimination can be the result of different underlying psychological processes.