ndication of naivete and vulnerability to danger.
This defense has, of necessity, constituted a drain on the psychic energy of African-Americans, resulting in the depletion of crea tive and innovative processes that could better be used to enhance their lives as well as those lives of majority group members. As a result of the manifestation of such attacks, augmented by the persistent relative powerlessness as a people to change their des tiny, African-Americans have literally "bought into" the attitudes and perpetrations of racist majority group members, consequently cultivating strategies and mechanisms designed to foster survival, rather than healthy ego development and fulfilling lives.
The perpetration of racially-based discrimination, also known as racism, against African-Americans has its foundation in the tragedy of prejudice. Jones (1972, p. 91) defines the phenomenon prejudice as ". . . a negative attitude toward a person or group based upon a social comparison process in which the individual's own group is taken as the positive point of reference." The term discrimination acts as the behavioral manifestation of prejudice, denoting ". . . those actions designed to maintain own-group characteristics and favored position at the expense of members of the comparison group" (p. 91). The term racism entails a form of dis crimination that is predicated upon race difference between mem bers of the majority group versus those of the minority group. As indicated by the above-noted definitions, that discrimination that is targeted against African-Americans is subsequent to the preju dicial beliefs of certain members of the majority group, "Whites." The phenomenon of racism is manifested in three forms and any ensuing combinations thereof: individual, institutional, and cultural dis crimination. The term racism is defined by Van den Berghe (Jones, 1972, pp. 91-92) as:
. . . any set of beliefs that organic, genetically t...