Location: Nebraska Union, UNL City Campus, 14th and R Streets
A campus map is available at http://maps.unl.edu/
Coordinated by: Sarah J. Gervais, Ph.D.
People often see nonhuman agents as human-like. Through the processes of anthropomorphism and humanization, people attribute human characteristics, including personalities, free will, and agency to pets, cars, gods, nature, and the like. Similarly, people often see human agents as less than human or object-like. For example, women, medical patients, racial minorities, and people with disabilities, are often seen as animal-like or less than human through dehumanization and objectification. These processes may be a considered a continuum with anthropomorphism and humanization on one end and dehumanization and objectification on the other end. Although researchers have identified some of the antecedents and consequences of these processes, a systematic investigation of the motivations that underlie this continuum is lacking. Considerations of this continuum may have considerable implications for such areas as everyday human functioning, interactions with people, animals, and objects, violence, discrimination, relationship development, mental health, or psychopathology. This symposium and edited volume will integrate multiple theoretical and empirical approaches on this issue.
Keynote speakers
-Rachel Calogero, Ph.D. (Virginia Wesleyan College)
-Nicholas Epley, Ph.D. (University of Chicago)
-Susan Fiske, Ph.D. (Princeton University)
-Jamie Goldenberg, Ph.D. (University of South Florida)
-Nicholas Haslam, Ph.D. (University of Melbourne)
-Bonnie Moradi, Ph.D. (University of Florida)
The Symposium will be followed by a published volume.