The Vilification of Arabs and Muslims: a Study of Perception and Bias

Conflict between groups does not arise in a vacuum. To the contrary, conflicts¿ especially those that are enduring and seemingly intractable¿ are embedded in an information-rich context, often with a long and complicated history characterized by multiple forces operating at different levels of analysis (economic, political, religious, interpersonal). Yet participants and outside observers are rarely overwhelmed by such complexity and ambiguity, adopting instead a coherent depiction of the conflict, often with an unequivocal allocation of blame to one side or the other. While we may know the final judgments of third party observers, it is not always clear how people arrive at these judgments. This work attempts to explain why people arrive at vastly different conclusions regarding blame when observing an ambiguous and complex situation of conflict. More specifically, it looks at popular misconceptions and stereotypes of Islam and seeks to explain how anti-Muslim prejudice has come to strongly influence perceptions of blame in real-world conflicts involving Arabs or Muslims.