Inconspicuous Terrorists? Effects of Terrorism News on Attitudes and Stereotypes About Muslims

Differentiation between terrorists and Muslims can mitigate the negative effects of terrorism news. In this study, participants were shown Islamist terrorism news in a quota-based 2 (news: differentiated vs. undifferentiated) × 2 (perpetrator characteristics: insider vs. outsider, that is, a threat from within vs. an alien threat) experiment ( N = 444). Exposure to differentiated news increased attitudinal differentiation of Muslims from terrorists, which in turn decreased negative stereotypes but not negative implicit attitudes. There were no differences in effects of exposure to coverage of insider versus outsider terrorists on either stereotypes or implicit attitudes. Stereotypes were strongest when news was differentiated and depicted outsider terrorists.