The perception of the poor: Capturing stereotype content with different measures
Open accessAbstract
Even though Sweden stands out in many ways, with for example a well-developed welfare system, there are some indications that Swedish egalitarianism does not include tolerance for people with low income. The present research concerns the content of the Swedish stereotype of poor people, and examines whether the poor are associated with just as negative traits as they are in other countries. Three different measurement methods were employed to investigate the contents and strength of the stereotype. In Study 1, participants freely associated on the perceived characteristics of Swedish citizens who receive welfare benefits. They also provided ratings of this group on traits related to warmth and competence. Study 2 employed both trait ratings and implicit measures (Single Category-IATs) in order to estimate the strength of the associations between the poor and warmth/competence, respectively. Across the different measures, the poor were associated with low competence and low–medium warmth. This corroborates the findings from previous research related to the Stereotype Content Model in other countries.
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One Swedish study found that respondents described the stereotypes about poor citizens using terms such as lazy, uneducated, unintelligent, dishonest, and work-shy.
“One Swedish study found that respondents described the stereotypes about”
From Tackling Educational Inequalities with Social Psychology: Identities, Contexts, and Interventions (2021) · cites this paper as Lindqvist, Björklund, & Bäckström, 2017
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“Following the procedure described in Karpinski and Steinman (2006), a reliability analysis on the SC-IAT measures from Study 2a revealed a reasonable level of internal consistency (αcorrect = .”
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- Authors
- Lindqvist, A., Björklund, F., & Bäckström, M.
- Affiliations
- Lund University (SE)
- Corresponding author
- Lindqvist, Anna
- Venue
- Nordic Psychology
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2017-01-09
- Volume
- 69
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 231-247
- ISSN
- 1901-2276 (ISSN-L)
- 1904-0016
- OpenAlex
- W2571398346
- Cited by
- 72
- References
- 56
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 14 · 2023: 12 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 22 · 2020: 1 · 2019: 5 · 2018: 2 · 2017: 2
- FWCI
- 7.00
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Nordic Psychology (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Lund University Publications (Lund University) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Vetenskapsrådet (2014-203)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Social Policy and Reform Studies
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › European Cultural and National Identity
- Keywords
- stereotypes of the poor, welfare recipients, warmth and competence, stereotype content model, implicit associations, free association
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