Susan Fiske: Biography Of This Social Psychologist
There are not many women psychologists who have received due attention, and it could be said that Susan Fiske is one of the few who has managed to receive the prominence she deserves.
A great student of social phenomena from a cognitive psychology perspective, this social psychologist has contributed several theories on social cognition to behavioral science, studying aspects such as the formation of sexism and prejudice. She has written multiple books and articles, all of them highly recommended reading.
But despite her work, she remains relatively little known outside this field of science. Let’s see her interesting life through this Susan Fiske biography in summary format.
Below we talk about the main vital events that are notable in the life of Susan Fiske, a social psychologist who is still alive today and working to disseminate this branch of behavioral science.
Early years of his life
Susan Tufts Fiske was born on August 19, 1952 in the United States. Fiske’s family environment has been made up of both psychologists and human rights defenders, which marked him since childhood in the interest of social psychology
His father, Donald W. Fiske, was a highly influential psychologist at the University of Chicago, while his mother, Barbara Page Fiske, was an activist leader. She is the sister of Alan Page Fiske, an anthropologist at UCLA, and her grandmother was a suffragette.
In 1973, at the age of 21, Susan Fiske He began his studies at Radcliffe College to obtain a degree in Social Relations She received her doctorate from Harvard University in 1978 with the thesis Attention and the Weighting of Behavior in Person Perception.
She currently resides in Princeton, New Jersey with her husband, sociologist Douglas Massey.
Career
Susan Fiske had the opportunity to work with Harvard professor Shelley Taylor, which allowed her to study social cognition, focusing primarily on the effect that attention has on social interactions After graduating, Fiske continued studying and working in the field of social cognition.
It should be said that, since the beginning of psychology as a science, the cognitive and social branches have never been in complete agreement, and one could even say that they maintain a certain conflict to this day.
Even so, Fiske managed, through his works, to unite the best of both branches, especially when he tried to delve more deeply into the study of social cognition. As a result of this, Fiske co-authored the book with Taylor Social Cognition
One of the great notable events of his professional career is that of giving a professional opinion in the case of Prince Waterhouse vs. Hopkins 1989.
In the case, Fiske gave his testimony being the first social psychologist to testify in a gender discrimination case This event sparked interest in the application of psychology in legal contexts.
Later, she was able to work with Peter Glick, during which time she set out to study dependency in male-female relationships, which allowed her to develop what would later become the theory of ambivalent sexism.
One of the most interesting investigations that Fiske carried out was that of analyze gender differences in social psychology publications especially from one of the most influential journals in the field, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
The conclusion of this research was that male social psychologists had a higher percentage of acceptance of their articles for publication compared to women, although the difference was not much greater (18% vs. 14%). In fact, she was able to see that the impact factor of female authors was the same compared to men if you looked at the number of citations in textbooks, in addition to being the most cited women per published article.
Susan Fiske has been involved in the formation and constitution of social cognitive neuroscience a field which investigates the neural bases behind social events.
His contributions to psychology
Susan Fiske’s scientific work is demonstrable based on the multiple books, articles and conferences she has given throughout her professional career. In all of them she addresses aspects of both the social and cognitive branches of psychology, explaining several theories related, above all, to the study of social cognition. There are four most relevant theories in all of her work.
Working together with Peter Glick, Fiske developed the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (ASI) a tool developed to record and understand prejudices towards the female group.
This inventory has two components related to stereotypes towards women: hostile sexism and benevolent sexism.
Hostile sexism is expressed towards especially women who do not meet the characteristics of the most traditional female figure or who fight for their rights.
On the other hand, benevolent sexism refers to overprotective and paternalistic behaviors aimed at women that do comply with the traditional image of what a woman should be like. The theory maintains that, in the interaction between men and women, the latter are forced to have to come closer to the traditional image of femininity if they want men to pay attention to them or help them advance in the workplace.
Although the privilege-contempt relationship usually goes in the direction of men and women, the theory maintains that both men and women can carry out both versions of sexism However, it is usually men who exercise, above all, hostile sexism.
2. Stereotype content model
The stereotype content model is a psychological theory that maintains that people tend to perceive social groups based on two fundamental dimensions: warmth and competence
Warmth refers to how friendly and confident the group is perceived to be, while competence refers to how competent the group is in achieving its social objectives.
This theory has been able to find that people who belong to the same social group, for example, North American middle class, perceive members of their same socioeconomic group as friendlier and more competent people compared to those of other groups.
Furthermore, it allows us to understand how people see other groups that do not have as many privileges or economic resources, such as refugees, people at risk of exclusion… seeing them as neither warm nor competent.
So that, there are both negative stereotypes towards other groups and positive stereotypes towards people from the same group exaggerating the threats and benefits of both groups.
3. Theory of power as control
The theory of power as control tries to explain how the classes that have power over society make that people behave by paying attention to or ignoring others based on how the wealthiest elites have established it.
4. Continuous model of impression formation
This model tries to explain how people form impressions of other people. It is theorized that these first impressions are formed based on two factors, one being the available information and the other being the motivations of the person who perceives them.
Based on these two factors, they help explain the tendency of people to follow criteria more related to the stereotypes accepted by the majority of the population or individual beliefs.
Recognitions
Susan Fiske has obtained several honorary degrees from various universities worldwide including the University of Basel (2013), Leiden (2009) and the Catholic University of Louvain (1995).
In 2010 She was awarded the APA Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award In 2013, Susan Fiske became an elected member of the American National Academy of Sciences.
She has served as president of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, APA Division 8, the Federation of Behavioral and Brain Sciences Associations, the American Psychological Society, and the Foundation for Advancement in Behavioral and Brain Sciences.
In 2014, a quantitative analysis was carried out in which it was concluded that Susan Fiske was one of the most eminent researchers in modern psychology positioned twenty-second place.
In that same analysis, she also occupied the 14th position in terms of most important living researchers and was considered the second most important female psychologist.
