The legal status of discrimination can alter personal prejudice against people with depression

Summary:  View help for Summary In a series of studies, we attempted to manipulate participants' beliefs about the legality of discrimination and measure shifts in their self-reported attitudes toward corresponding social groups. In the first two listed studies (those marked 1a and 1b), we described a hypothetical alien world with novel discriminatory acts, a novel legal system, and novel social groups. In the next two listed studies (those marked as 2 and 3), we manipulated the claim that discrimination on the basis of mental illness is currently legal in the United States and measured attitudes toward people with depression. This archive also includes four related studies with various methodological limitations (e.g., participants were reluctant to believe that discrimination against a Hindu job applicant could be legal, in contrast to a job applicant with depression). Those studies appear in the "other studies" folder.

All of the experiments were conducted online and all employed convenience samples. Most participants were recruited via Amazon Mechanical Turk. For the "Wiccan job applicant" study, participants were recruited via Prolific and the Syracuse University psychology subject pool.

The dates of the individual studies are listed below:

1a - fictional beings (individuals) | September 2016
1b - fictional beings (groups) | January 2017
2 - depression discrimination | July 2015
3 - depression discrimination replication | January 2019
other studies/airport racial profiling | May 2015
other studies/comparison of groups - employment discrimination | August 2017
other studies/Hindu job applicant | August 2017
other studies/Wiccan job applicant | October-November 2018

For notes about the various data files, see the text files included in this archive.

I recognize that the documentation of this project could be more detailed. I have many projects that could benefit from additional public documentation. If you are using the data, please reach out to me via email and I can prioritize sharing more information about this one. My most up-to-date email address should be available at saraemilyburke.com/contact.html.

Subject Terms:  View help for Subject Terms expressive law; discrimination; court legitimacy; depression; mental illness; stigma; prejudice

Geographic Coverage:  View help for Geographic Coverage United States of America

Collection Date(s):  View help for Collection Date(s) 5/2015 – 1/2019 (Eight studies conducted between 2015 and 2019 (see data files))