Promoting Human Rights of Blacks by Attributing Uniquely Human Emotions

This contribution addresses the issue of reduction of dehumanization of Black people-- a group that is still overtly discriminated--by acknowledging their inalienability of human rights, that is, employing a novel, explicit, political measure of others’ humanity in terms of their deservingness to be granted fundamental human rights. Dehumanization was detected through the classical subtle implicit measure of infrahumanization (i.e., the attribution of uniquely human emotions) and through perceived inalienability of human rights towards a Black target. The role of multiple categorization alone and in combination with activation of human identity as optimizing factors reducing Blacks’ dehumanization was considered. The study aimed at testing for the first time whether the implicit cognition on target’s humanity expressed attribution of secondary emotions to the Black target mediated the effects of multiple categorization and activation of human identity on the acknowledgement of inalienability of human rights of the target. Results highlighted that multiple categorization and, especially its combination with activation of human identity, led to reduced dehumanization of the Black target. Most importantly, attribution of secondary emotions mediated the effects of the aforementioned factors on inalienability of human rights of the Black target. Evidence from this study sheds light on the role of implicit cognition in driving inalienability of human rights to traditionally discriminated minorities and in promoting social change in multicultural societies. The implications of attribution of human rights to minorities as an indicator of their humanity with all it entails in terms of reduced discrimination and acceptance will be discussed.