New Learning Resource on SegregationNew Learning Resource on Segregation

Social Psychology Network, a nonprofit educational organization funded by the National Science Foundation, recently released a web-based learning resource on the topic of segregation, and we're writing to let you know about it:

http://www.UnderstandingPrejudice.org/segregation

Building on the work of Nobel Laureate Thomas Schelling, this new interactive resource shows that small social preferences at the individual level can generate surprising patterns of segregation at the group level, and equally important, that the dynamic can be reversed to reduce segregation.

Everyone knows that prejudice can lead to segregation -- to the separation of groups by race, gender, or other social categories. It was this type of segregation that Rosa Parks fought in 1955 when she refused an Alabama bus driver's demand that she move to the rear with other Black riders.

But why does segregation still occur today in schools and other places where people support social equality? Nobel Laureate Thomas Schelling proposed an answer in the 1970s, writing that racial discrimination arises not only from behavior that is "heartless, selfish and illegal" but "from the magnification of small incentives into massive results."

To find out what he meant, click here.