this line of conceptualization to the area of intergroup relations, one should start with the recognition that the area of interaction between groups cannot be directly extrapolated from the nature of relations within groups or from prevailing practices within them, even though a careful analysis of intragroup relations is an essential prerequisite in any approach to intergroup relations. We could mention numerous instances of intergroup relations in which the pattern (positive or negative) is different from the pattern prevailing within the respective ingroups.
Thus, in addition to studying relations prevailing within the ingroups in question, one has to study the interaction process between groups and its consequences in their own right.
The conceptual orientation just outlined determined, first, the formulation of specific hypotheses; second, the design of the experiment through three successive stages; third, in selecting the subjects and choosing the setting, the choice of criteria that would not permit the direct intrusion of influences other than those experimentally introduced; and fourth, the special considerations related to observational and experimental techniques to be used in the collection of data, and the specific roles staff members would occupy.
Methodological Considerations
The problem of intergroup relations has not been the domain of experimentation. Literally, only a few studies have been specifically designed to experiment on intergroup relations. Therefore, the present study undertakes to define main functional relations involved in the problem and to point, on the basis of data obtained, to some unmistakable trends.
The experimental study of intergroup relations requires that various conditions between groups be experimentally introduced and manipulated; the nature of these conditions should be defined and the consequences of their variation predicted.
Recent research in both psychology and sociology and indications of attempts by practitioners in this area are making it increasingly evident that theoretical and practical problems of group relations have to be studied in terms of the interaction processes within and between appropriate group settings. This observation includes the study of attitudes and change of attitudes that regulate the behavior of individuals within their respective ingroups and in relations with outgroups.
The usual practice in attitude studies has been to study the effects of already existing attitudes or to measure attitudes that are already formed. When carried out apart from particular group settings, the study of motives (drives), frustrations, past experience, and similar factors (which certainly operate in the formation, functioning, and change of social attitudes pertaining to group relations) has given us items of information whose validity has not been proven in actual issues of group relations. The attempt in this study is to trace the formation, functioning, and change of attitudes toward one’s own group, toward its various members, and toward outgroups and their members as these attitudes develop within the setting of group interaction processes and as consequences thereof.
The study’s method was to experimentally produce ingroups themselves and the attitudes of members toward one another and toward the ingroup as a whole. In other words, group attitudes (both intra- and intergroup) were to start from scratch and to be produced as a consequence of interaction processes in intra- and intergroup relations through the introduction of specified experimental conditions. We need not elaborate on the methodological gain from experimentally producing attitudes whose effects or change are to be studied or measured.
Considerations such as those briefly mentioned above determined the approach taken, the specific hypotheses formulated, and the design of the experiment in three successive stages. Likewise, they determined the choice of particular methods and cautions to be pursued in the collection of data.
To approximate as much as possible the natural process of spontaneous group formation—of ingroup and outgroup delineation with its consequences so abundantly reported in the literature on small groups—subjects were kept unaware that this was an experiment on intergroup relations. (See “Subject Selection” in the next chapter for information given to teachers and parents concerning the experiment.)
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