Teorías implícitas y esencialismo psicológico: Herramientas conceptuales para el estudio de las relaciones entre y dentro de los grupos

Abstract

In social psychology, the implicit theories are a recent field of study. Nevertheless, in the last decades, they have been revealed as a promissory area of investigation for the understanding of group's phenomena. The present paper gives attention to the implicit theories that concern the nature of human groups and, in particular psychological essentialism. Essentialism is the belief that an underlying essence lies at the root of every social category. Our revision of some recent investigations indicates that the essentialism is an interesting variable to consider because it has impact in all phenomena that are vulnerable to social perception such as the in-group deviation and the social projection. © 2008 Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile.