Bystander Responses to Intergroup Social Exclusion Using the Cyberball Paradigm

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Integrative Statement

Minority-group children’s experiences of exclusion and discrimination are prevalent and damaging (Killen & Rutland, 2011). When taking place in the school environment, intergroup social exclusion can perpetuate prejudice and discrimination, negatively impacting peer relationships and additional outcomes. As social exclusion can be very subtle, it can be difficult for teachers to detect. However, children who witness social exclusion among their peers (“bystanders”) are typically present, and could help challenge it (Salmivalli, 2014; Palmer & Abbott, 2017). Bystander research informs strategies to address bullying, but typically has not focused on intergroup social exclusion (Nesdale, 2008; Sierksma, et al, 2014).

Participants were 8-11 year olds (N=158, 43% female, all identifying as “White Britsh”) from the South East of England. We employed an adaptation of the well-established online “cyberball” game (Mulvey et al., 2018) to determine children’s actual bystander responses during inter-ethnic social exclusion. Participants took part in a 4-player online ball-throwing game where player 1 (perpetrator) and player 2 (reinforcer) excluded player 3 (victim). We manipulated the group memberships of the players so they were either ethnic-ingroup (White British) or outgroup (Bangladeshi) to the participant (player 4). Importantly, we test whether children demonstrated support for the excluded peer (victim) and the excluding peer (perpetrator), based on the proportion of passes made to these players in the game.

Results showed that excluded victims were generally passed to more (M=.494) than perpetrators (M=.237), p<.05. However an interaction revealed that participants passed to perpetrators and victims differently, depending on their group membership. To examine this further, we analysed passes made to the perpetrator and victim separately. For passes to the perpetrator, more passes were made to ingroup perpetrators when they excluded another ingroup player (M=.243) compared to when outgroup players excluded an ingroup player (M=.172). This demonstrates an ingroup bias, as participants are favouring ingroup perpetrators over outgroup perpetrators by passing to them relatively more. Additionally, more passes were made to the excluded players when they were outgroup excluded by outgroup peers (M=.543) or ingroup excluded by outgroup peers (M=.540) compared to when both the perpetrator and victim were ingroup players (M=.471), see Figure 1.

These findings indicate that, overall, children actively attempted to rectify the exclusion of the excluded victim by continuing to include them within the game as well as passing less frequently to the perpetrator. However, participants also demonstrated an awareness of intergroup dynamics, as they also took into account the group memberships of victims when making inclusion decisions. In particular, it seems that our participants demonstrated favour towards ingroup perpetrators compared to outgroup perpetrators. When exclusion was perpetrated by outgroup peers compared to ingroup, more passes were made to include the victim. This suggests that an awareness of group bias, group loyalty and group repercussions may be driving differences in bystander inclusion decisions (see Palmer & Abbott, 2017). Implications for bystander research in intergroup contexts, and the use of different measures to determine actual behaviors will be discussed.

Authors

• Sally B. Palmer, Goldsmiths, University of London
  Presenting Author

• Jellie Sierksma, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  Non-Presenting Author

• Nataly Kaufman, University College London
  Non-Presenting Author

• Adam Rutland, Goldsmiths, University of London
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ayse Sule Yuksel, Goldsmiths University of London
  Non-Presenting Author