Can Social Contact Reduce Prejudice and Discrimination? Evidence from a Field Experiment in Nigeria
Abstract
Can positive social contact between members of antagonistic groups reduce prejudice and discrimination? Despite extensive research on social contact, observational studies are difficult to interpret because prejudiced people may select out of contact with out-group members. We overcome this problem by conducting an education-based, randomized field experiment—the Urban Youth Vocational Training program (UYVT)—with 849 randomly sampled Christian and Muslim young men in riot-prone Kaduna, Nigeria. After sixteen weeks of positive intergroup social contact, we find no changes in prejudice, but heterogeneous-class subjects discriminate significantly less against out-group members than subjects in homogeneous classes. We trace this finding to increased discrimination by homogeneous-class subjects compared to non-UYVT study participants, and we highlight potentially negative consequences of in-group social contact. By focusing on skill-building instead of peace messaging, our intervention minimizes reporting bias and offers strong experimental evidence that intergroup social contact can alter behavior in constructive ways, even amid violent conflict.
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Positive interpersonal contact does not necessarily lead to attitude change in contexts where intergroup relations are charged by a history of violent conflict.
“positive interpersonal contact does not necessarily lead to attitude change in contexts where intergroup relations are charged by a history of violent conflict (27)”
From A field experiment on community policing and police legitimacy (2019) · cites this paper as [27]
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Prejudice Reduction: Progress and Challenges
Paluck, E. L., Porat, R., Clark, C. S., & Green, D. P. (2021) · Annual Review of Psychology · doi:10.1146/annurev-psych-071620-030619 · Cited by 686 · see citing works
A field experiment on community policing and police legitimacy
Peyton, K., Sierra-Arévalo, M., & Rand, D. G. (2019) · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · doi:10.1073/pnas.1910157116 · Cited by 254 · see citing works
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- Authors
- SCACCO, A., & WARREN, S. S.
- Affiliations
- WZB Berlin Social Science Center (DE)
- Corresponding author
- SCACCO, ALEXANDRA
- WARREN, SHANA S.
- Venue
- American Political Science Review
- Publisher
- Cambridge University Press (CUP)
- Published
- 2018-04-04
- Volume
- 112
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 654-677
- ISSN
- 0003-0554 (ISSN-L)
- 1537-5943
- OpenAlex
- W2795668280
- Cited by
- 304
- References
- 93
- Citations by year
- 2026: 25 · 2025: 38 · 2024: 55 · 2023: 32 · 2022: 38 · 2021: 41 · 2020: 23 · 2019: 39 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 1
- FWCI
- 69.99
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- American Political Science Review (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Econstor (Econstor) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- United States Institute of Peace
- York University
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Names, Identity, and Discrimination Research
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Political Conflict and Governance
- Keywords
- intergroup contact, prejudice, discrimination, Christian-Muslim relations, religious conflict, youth vocational training, skill development, violent conflict, reporting bias
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