The Meaning of Collective Terrorist Threat: Understanding the Subjective Causes of Terrorism Reduces Its Negative Psychological Impact

This article hypothesized that the possibility to construct intellectual meaning of a terrorist attack (i.e., whether participants can cognitively understand why the perpetrators did their crime) reduces the negative psychological consequences typically associated with increased terrorist threat. Concretely, the authors investigated the effect of intellectual meaning (induced by providing additional information about potential economic, cultural, and historical reasons for the terrorist attack) on perceived terrorist threat and associated emotional well-being. Study 1 revealed that pictures of terrorist attacks elicited less experienced terrorist threat when they were presented with background information about the terrorists’ motives (meaning provided) rather than without additional background information (no meaning provided). Study 2 replicated this effect with a different manipulation of terrorist threat (i.e., newspaper article) and clarified the underlying psychological process: Participants in the high terror salience condition with meaning provided experienced less terrorist threat and thus more emotional well-being in the face of crisis than participants in the high terror salience condition without meaning provided. Theoretical and practical implications in the context of psychological health and mass media effects are discussed

Dealing with disagreement:The depolarizing effects of everyday diplomatic skills face-to-face and online

In online text-based discussions, people behave less diplomatically because they are more outspoken and less responsive. This can feed impressions of polarization. This article uses a new methodology to isolate the influence of outspokenness and responsiveness in shaping perceptions of polarization in online chat and face-to-face discussions. Text-based online and face-to-face discussions were reproduced in a face-to-face format (Study 1) and in a text-based chat format (Study 2). Uninformed observers (N = 102 and N = 103, repeated measures) evaluated these. The results showed that responsiveness was generally considered indicative of agreement and good social relationships but the interpretation of outspokenness (or lack of ambiguity) depended on the medium format. This suggests that what counts as diplomacy is not the same for each medium. Moreover, the experiences of the actors reproducing the chats in a face-to-face format highlighted the differences between media. We conclude that online conversational dynamics may play an important role in societal polarization

Relative Deprivation and Relative Wealth Enhances Anti-Immigrant Sentiments:The V-Curve Re-Examined

Previous research has shown that negative attitudes towards immigrants and support for anti-immigrant parties are observed both among those experiencing relative deprivation and those experiencing relative gratification (so called v-curve). Whereas the effect of relative deprivation is intuitive, the effect of relative gratification is more difficult to explain. Why would economic prosperity provoke negative attitudes towards immigrants? We first present correlational (Study 1) and experimental (Study 2) support for the v-curve. In Study 1, in a national Swiss referendum, a higher percentage anti-immigrant voting was found in cantons with relatively lower and relatively higher relative disposable income. In Study 2, in a hypothetical society, more opposition to 'newcomers' joining society was found among poor or above average wealth group members than among those in a moderate wealth group condition. In Study 3, we replicate this finding and also show that opposition to immigration is higher for all wealth groups when societal inequality is growing rather than declining. In a final study, we examine different forms of relative gratification and mediators of the relationship between relative gratification and opposition to immigration (i.e., identification, collective self-definition as competent and cold, and fear about future wealth). Only fear about future wealth mediates this relationship. We conclude that, paradoxically, relative gratification effects are partly due to the fear of future deprivation

When Voting Becomes Protest:Mapping Determinants of Collective Action Onto Voting Behavior

Do people signal protest by bringing out a protest vote when they feel they have been collectively disadvantaged? Political scientists have been interested in "protest voting" yet theoretical understanding is limited. Social psychologists have studied other forms of collective protest extensively. The present study integrates insights from the political science approach to protest voting and the social psychological approach to protest behavior to study how a context of perceived collective disadvantage influences voting for protest parties. We conducted a field study with a quasi-experimental design. This allowed us to study effects of a plausibly exogenous variable-the presence versus absence of societal disadvantage (the experience of man-made earthquakes)-on both determinants of and on subsequent protest voting. Results reveal that the presence of earthquakes affects levels of protest voting via (national) trust, regional identification, and perceptions of efficacy.</p

The return of moral motivation in predicting collective action against collective disadvantage

The social psychology of collective action against collective disadvantage has hitherto underspecified, not to say neglected, the profound power of moral motivations. This is particularly important because moral motivations can unite disadvantaged and advantaged group members to fight for a joint cause (e. g., civil rights). After a brief review of the literature on collective action and moral motivation, we propose that moral convictions, defined as strong and absolute stances on moralised issues, represent an essential part of moral motivation. Hence, any violation of a moral conviction motivates individuals to change the situation. Because this motivation leads to identification with the relevant group, it effectively integrates moral conviction with the Social Identity Model of Collective Action (SIMCA; Van Zomeren, Postmes & Spears, 2008). This model suggests that a relevant social identity is the psychological basis for undertaking collective action motivated by group identification, group-based anger, and group efficacy. Our approach thus explains how seemingly individualistic moral convictions can have collective consequences

Disrupting the flow:How brief silences in group conversations affect social needs

AbstractWe all know the awkward feeling when a conversation is disrupted by a brief silence. This paper studies why such moments can be unsettling. We suggest that silences are particularly disturbing if they disrupt the conversational flow. In two experiments we examined the effects of a single brief instance of silence on social needs, perceived consensus, emotions, and rejection. Study 1 demonstrated that fluent conversations are associated with feelings of belonging, self-esteem, and social validation. If a brief silence disrupts this fluency, negative emotions and feelings of rejection arise. Study 2 replicated these effects in a more realistic setting, and showed that the effects of a brief silence are considerable despite participants' unawareness of the silence. Together, results show that conversational flow induces a sense of belonging and positive self-esteem. Moreover, this research suggests an implicit route to social validation, in which consensus is inferred from fluent group conversation

On conviction's collective consequences:Integrating moral conviction with the social identity model of collective action

This article examines whether and how moral convictions predict collective action to achieve social change. Because moral convictions defined as strong and absolute stances on moral issues tolerate no exceptions, any violation motivates individuals to actively change that situation. We propose that moral convictions have a special relationship with politicized identities and collective action because of the potentially strong normative fit between moral convictions and the action-oriented content of politicized identities. This effectively integrates moral conviction with the Social Identity Model of Collective Action (Van Zomeren, Postmes, & Spears, 2008), which predicts that, on the basis of a relevant social identity, group-based anger and efficacy predict collective action. Results from two studies indeed showed that moral convictions predicted collective action intentions (Study 12) and collective action (Study 2) through politicized identification, group-based anger, and group efficacy. We discuss theoretical and practical implications of our integrative model