Nationalistic collective rituals, intergroup relations, and legitimation of national social systems

Indexación: Scopus.In this article, we test if international football matches in Latin America can be understood as nationalistic collective rituals and if participating in them leads to prejudicial attitudes toward immigrants and to legitimize the national social systems. Based on social identity theory and literature on collective rituals, we propose that participating in collective rituals makes cognitively salient social identity over self-identity through collective emotions. Therefore, individuals are more motivated to perceive the social systems as fair and legitimate and to show outgroup derogation. In Study 1 (N = 414), interest in football was associated with national identification a week before an international tournament in Brazil, Chile, and Spain. This association was mediated by fusion of identity with the national ingroup but not by experiencing collective positive emotions. In Study 2 (N = 118), we used an experimental design and showed that nationalism moderated the effect of participating in nationalistic collective rituals on measures related to behavioral intentions. Specifically, these rituals decreased outgroup prejudice among high nationalistic participants. Collective rituals are discussed as a form of collective self-affirmation that may have reduced defensiveness and led nationalistic individuals to behave according to the predominant values within a society.https://www.rips-irsp.com/articles/10.5334/irsp.291

A longitudinal study of the effects of internet use on subjective well-being

This study examined how internet use is related to subjective well-being, using longitudinal data from 19 nations with representative online samples stratified for age, gender, and region (N = 7122, 51.43% women, Mage = 45.26). Life satisfaction and anxiety served as indices of subjective well-being at time 1 (t1) and then six months later (t2). Frequency of internet use (hours online per day) at t1 correlated with lower life satisfaction, r = - .06, and more anxiety, r = .13 at t2. However, after imposing multivariate controls, frequency of internet use (t1) was no longer associated with lower subjective well-being (t2). Frequency of social contact by internet and use of internet for following rumors (t1) predicted higher anxiety (t2). Higher levels of direct (face-to-face plus phone) social contact (t1) predicted greater life satisfaction (t2). In multivariate analyses, all effect sizes were small. Society-level individualismcollectivism or indulgence-restraint did not show a direct effect on outcomes nor moderate individual-level associations. Results are discussed in the framework of the internet as a displacement of social contact versus a replacement of deficits in direct contact; and as a source of positive and negative information

The Political Attitudes and Subjective Wellbeing of the One Percent

In capitalist societies, individuals who occupy the highest positions in the economic hierarchy feature prominently in the political discourse under the moniker of the One Percent. However, little is known about how the psychology of One Percent might differ from that of the average person. Using a large, nationally representative sample in New Zealand (N = 14,650), we aimed to fill this gap examining the political attitudes and subjective wellbeing of the top one percent of the income distribution. We found that, compared to general public, the One Percent more strongly legitimize the political and economic systems in society, and express lower support for redistributive taxation. They also report higher life satisfaction, self-esteem and belongingness compared to everyone else. Thus, the One Percent benefit not only economically and politically from the current system, but also psychologically. Moreover, their political beliefs serve to bolster the inequality from which they benefit