Proximity attitudes toward objects and people: reference to a category and a self-representation?

The relative strength of similarity to self and category typicality as predictors of proximity attitudes (social distance) toward people of varying race and objects associated with people of varying race was investigated. Similarity to self and category typicality were significant predictors of proximity attitudes toward both objects and people, but similarity to self was the significantly stronger predictor. The predictive utility of similarity to self was greater for object judgments than person judgments, but category typicality was a better predictor of person judgments than object judgments. Although the results provide evidence of ingroup favoritism in proximity attitudes toward people, the ingroup bias did not extend to objects associated with people. Category typicality was positively related to attitudes, even for distanced groups. The role of predictability of the target in determining proximity attitudes is discussed.