Evaluation of Intercultural Instructional Multimedia Material on Implicit Xenophobic Cognition: Short Time Effects on Implicit Information Processing

Considering xenophobic attacks against foreigners and ethnic or religious motivated wars, there is a need for educational concepts to extinguish xenophobia. A model describing the cognitive processes involved in Xenophobic cognition was developed. Instructional multimedia material that discussed various forms of alienation was developed and evaluated. The computer program was based on research findings and proven intercultural teaching strategies. To evaluate the training sessions, methods were developed to measure attitudes toward foreigners. Based on a multi-method concept an evaluation-tool was created that validated the effectiveness of long-term intervention programs and short-term effects on an implicit level of awareness. The procedure used the implicit association test. The applied methods were evaluated in a study with 79 High School students (46.8% female; mean age = 14.13, SD = 1.16) within a one-factorial control group design. Although there were no significant results in explicit measures of attitude, there was a significant change in implicit measures showing a reduction of implicit xenophobic cognitive processes in the experimental group and an increase in the control group. Results imply that the chosen tutorial methods lead to a change in attitudes on trait and state-level regarding xenophobic self-concept. [This article has been retracted at the request of the authors. Due to highly unethical practices, which include data manipulation and falsification of results in this research, this article has been retracted. One of the conditions of the submission of a paper for publication is that authors declare explicitly that their work is original with the research results being conclusive from genuine research data. As such this article represents a severe abuse of the scientific publishing system. The editorial board takes a firm view on this matter and apologies are offered to readers of the journal that this was not detected during the submission process.]