The effectiveness of intergroup dialogue in promoting social action

Abstract

Research has shown that intergroup dialogue (IGD) is an effective method in promoting multicultural education (Muller & Miles, 2017; Hopkins & Domingue, 2015; Lopez-Humphreys & Dawson, 2014). IGD prepares students with cognitive and communication skills that prepare students to engage in and show commitment for social action (Hopkins & Domingue, 2015; Nagda, Gurin, Sorenson, Gurin-Sands, & Osuna, 2009); however, research examining how IGD influences social action is sparse (Krings, Austic, Gutiérrez, & Dirksen, 2015). The limited research examining the impact of IGD on promoting social action fails to compare courses with an IGD component to traditional courses to determine if IGD contributes to greater social action (Lopez-Humphreys & Dawson, 2015). The present study sought to investigate whether IGD promotes higher levels of social action in undergraduate college students than traditional lecture/discussion-based diversity courses. Results showed no statistically significant main effects of course (IGD and non-IGD) or time (pre-post) across all scales. However, there was a statistically significant time x course interaction on the SJS total scale, as well as three subscales (SJA, SJPBC, and SJBI). Results from the qualitative analysis showed that participants in the class with an IGD component expressed more interest and engaged in more social action than students in the class without an IGD component at the end of the semester. The findings of this study highlight that IGD is an effective method for encouraging multicultural education and promoting social action.