Favoring Inequalities and Mind-Reading: Social Dominance Orientation Relates to Poor Mentalizing

Abstract

Although studies have so far investigated social dominance orientation (SDO) in relation to its association with prejudice and discrimination toward outgroups, it is not known whether SDO’s link with poor intergroup relations might be underlined by specific socio-cognitive factors such as reduced mind-reading motivation (MRM) and poor mind-reading performance. The present study tested whether endorsement of SDO is associated with decreased MRM and mind-reading accuracy toward both ingroup and outgroup targets. We randomly assigned one hundred and 20 Turkish university students (Mage = 22.02) into two target groups for mind-reading, Turkish ingroup (N = 60) and Syrian outgroup (N = 60), and asked them to infer minds of either ingroup or outgroup members depending on their target group. Participants also reported their level of MRM and SDO through questionnaires. When the target was a Turkish ingroup member, SDO negatively and directly predicted mind-reading, when the target was an outgroup member, however, higher SDO indirectly predicted lower mind-reading through reduced MRM. These results pointed that favoring intergroup hierarchies relates to poor understanding of others’ mental states although the mechanism of the relation changes depending on the group membership of the target.