Aggressive Interaktionen und soziale Diskriminierung: Zur Rolle perspektiven- und kontextspezifischer Legitimationsprozesse

Theories and experiments about aggressive behaviour, on the one hand, and theories and experiments about social discrimination, on the other hand, are rarely associated with each other. Based upon a summary of more recent work in both domains, the article lines out that a consideration of parallels between the two phenomena could be fruitful. While perspective- and context-specific interpretation is an integral part of many recent concepts about aggression, there is still no comparable analysis concerning ingroup favouritism and outgroup derogation. Based on a critical discussion of research on the "mere categorisation effect" it is argued that theories of intergroup behaviour should similarly take into account that unequal treatment of groups is based on subjective interpretation and legitimisation.