Laboratory and field tests were made of the contact hypothesis that individuals from hostile groups will show favorable attitude changes after working together in an interdependent and equalitarian situation. Groups studied included female college students, disadvantaged mothers, airmen, and teachers in newly desegregated schools. (SJL)

Research on justice has taken many directions. What people see as just and unjust, how they react to perceived injustice, and what principles of justice are preferred in different contexts are some of the questions that have been posed in the literature. Less time has been spent on the related questions of whether people change over time in these…

H.B. Gerard (1983) has misrepresented the content of the 1954 Social Science Statement. His appraisal of school desegregation is misleading in terms of both its current status and future potential; further, the actual and potential role of social science in public policy is more extensive than Gerard has claimed. (CMG)

Proposals to use interracial/cross-ethnic learning teams in desegregated classrooms raise issues from research that demonstrate the complicated nature of the relationship between learning teams and classroom interracial relations. According to the research, relationships are affected by the characteristics of learning teams, namely…

Social scientists can make two different types of contributions to school desegregation. One of these is to continue to collaborate with lawyers and judges in the legal proceedings necessary to convert the desegregation ideal into reality. The other is to greatly increase their collaboration with educators to make desegregation a more positive…

This was a study of the influence of unintended interracial contact and characteristics of the contact situation on attitude-related action and attitude change. It was designed to determine if persons with initially negative racial attitudes would change these attitudes by an experimental experience. The research subjects were white students from…

Describes field and experimental research that sought means to promote respect for lower status outgroups. Explores alternative approaches to improving justice. Reviews recent empirical work focused on the following topics: (1) reducing negative stereotypes; (2) diminishing justifications for bias; and (3) increasing intergroup attraction. (JS)