Susan Fiske Professor of PsychologyPrinceton University
Susan Fiske is a psychologist known for her work in the field of social cognition. Her research has shown how prejudice, stereotyping, and discrimination are influenced by social relationships, and also how dynamics of cooperation, competition, and power can affect how people view other groups. This research has led her to the conclusion that prejudices are an inevitable part of the human condition, but that they are also quite malleable and subject to change. Fiske notes that "when people are on our side, we take the trouble to know them. This conclusion fits decades of research about how to get people from mutual outgroups—black/white, gay/straight, old/young, disabled/not, immigrant/host—to treat each other as individual human beings. When people come together across ingroup/outgroup boundaries, they get to know each other as individuals mainly when they need each other in the service of shared goals." In recent years, her work has focused on finding the neural correlates to prejudices using the tools of social neuroscience.
Envy Up, Scorn Down: How Status Divides Us
Facing Social Class: How Societal Rank Influences Interaction (with Hazel Rose Markus)
Social Beings: Core Motives in Social Psychology
Social Cognition: From Brains to Culture