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Elaboration moderates reliance on metacognitive assessments: The case of attitude certainty

The circumstances under which people are more likely to use their attitude certainty were examined. Across three studies, participants shared their attitudes on current topics (e.g. refugees). Then, attitude certainty was either measured or manipulated, depending on the study. Elaboration was assessed via need for cognition or manipulated after forming attitudes and certainty, just before the behavioural decision. Attitudes, certainty, and elaboration served as predictors of different behavioural outcomes (e.g. enrolling in a mentoring programme). As predicted, attitudes guided behaviour. Furthermore, the greater the certainty, the greater attitude-behaviour correspondence (A–B consistency), replicating the traditional effect. Most relevant, the effect of already existing attitude certainty in moderating A–B consistency was more likely to occur for high (vs. low) elaboration participants. Following Self-Validation Theory (Briñol & Petty, Psychol. Rev., 129, 2022, 340), this research showed that elaboration can moderate reliance on metacognition determining A–B consistency.

Intuitive judgements towards artificial intelligence verdicts of moral transgressions

Automated decision-making systems have become increasingly prevalent in morally salient domains of services, introducing ethically significant consequences. In three pre-registered studies (N = 804), we experimentally investigated whether people's judgements of AI decisions are impacted by a belief alignment with the underlying politically salient context of AI deployment over and above any general attitudes towards AI people might hold. Participants read conservative- or liberal-framed vignettes of AI-detected statistical anomalies as a proxy for potential human prejudice in the contexts of LGBTQ+ rights and environmental protection, and responded to willingness to act on the AI verdicts, trust in AI, and perception of procedural fairness and distributive fairness of AI. Our results reveal that people's willingness to act, and judgements of trust and fairness seem to be constructed as a function of general attitudes of positivity towards AI, the moral intuitive context of AI deployment, pre-existing politico-moral beliefs, and a compatibility between the latter two. The implication is that judgements towards AI are shaped by both the belief alignment effect and general AI attitudes, suggesting a level of malleability and context dependency that challenges the potential role of AI serving as an effective mediator in morally complex situations.

Majority friendship and support for social change: Examining the role of ethnic and politicized identifications among Indigenous people in Chile

This study revisits an alleged ‘sedative’ effect of intergroup friendship on minority support for social change. Focusing on support for political action and empowering policies among Indigenous minorities in Chile, we examine both friendship with majority Chileans and personal discrimination; we distinguish ethnic and politicized minority identifications as hypothetical processes connecting intergroup contact with political outcomes; and we propose majority friends' perceived valuation of Indigenous minority friendships as a hypothetical buffer against sedation. Drawing on a large-scale stratified national sample of Indigenous peoples (N = 1856, aged 17–90), we tested half-longitudinal, (fully) cross-lagged models over 2 years. Qualifying earlier evidence of sedation, negative effects of majority friendship on minority support for social change were exclusively found cross-sectionally, and only when majority friends were perceived not to value minority friendships. In contrast, majority friendship had direct positive effects on support for social change over time. We also found that friendship promoted politicized identification over time, which in turn was associated with more support for social change. Personal discrimination predicted more support for social change both directly and indirectly. We conclude that majority friendship need not compromise and may instead promote minority group members' support for change towards equality.

When empathy leads to aggression: The effects of empathy on punitive attitudes towards aggressors

When witnessing aggression, individuals often empathize more with victims than with aggressors, which may bias their perceptions and interpretations of the transgressions. However, the mechanisms underlying these biases remain poorly understood. Through two experiments, we investigated whether people's decisions to condemn aggressors are influenced by their predisposition to sympathize with the victim and explored how negative sentiments towards the aggressor may influence these decisions. Further, we tested the moderating role of callous-unemotional traits, hypothesizing that moral judgements and decisions to punish may differ among individuals who are less emotionally responsive, as they are less likely to sympathize with victims. Our findings revealed that greater empathy for victims intensified punitive attitudes towards aggressors, primarily mediated by participants' negative evaluations of the aggressor. Notably, such empathic inclinations were less prevalent among individuals with higher levels of callous-unemotional traits, as reflected by their lower concern for victims and greater inclination towards harsh punishments. These results offer insights into how justice-related attitudes may be shaped and potentially biased by individual differences in emotional responsiveness.

Power and resistance: Black Americans' multifaceted perceptions of ingroup strengths and their effects on collective efficacy and resistance

The current research examines perceived ingroup strengths and their relationship with collective efficacy, generalized power, and resistance among Black Americans. Two studies investigated how different perceptions of ingroup strengths (e.g. collective resilience, ingroup solidarity, intergroup coalitions, ingroup resistance, and intergroup respect) were associated with generalized power perceptions, perceived collective efficacy, and resistance behaviours. Study 1 demonstrated that collective resilience, ingroup solidarity, and intergroup coalitions predicted increased collective efficacy, which in turn predicted organized resistance but not everyday resistance. Perceived control over resources and influence predicted generalized power but not resistance behaviours. Study 2 extended these findings by including perceived ingroup resistance and intergroup respect. Ingroup resistance and intergroup respect predicted collective efficacy, which mediated their effects on both organized and everyday resistance. Unlike in Study 1, collective resilience, ingroup solidarity, and intergroup coalitions had no significant effects on collective efficacy in Study 2, though ingroup solidarity directly predicted organized resistance. Generalized power perceptions were linked to lower everyday resistance. These findings highlight the complex interplay between different perceived ingroup strengths and their distinct roles in fostering collective efficacy and resistance against racial oppression.

Social identity switching: An investigation of non‐demographic identities with computational‐linguistic and self‐report measures

Understanding potential costs of social identity switching contributes to our knowledge of how people manage their various group memberships in a fast-paced and interconnected world. Recent research demonstrates that people can switch between demographic social identities seamlessly. The current studies advance this research by (1) moving beyond demographic identities to identities that are not perceptually distinguishable, (2) developing a new identity switching paradigm based on an implicit computational linguistic style measure of salience and (3) including self-report measures of salience, task difficulty and performance. In two within-subjects studies (N = 211; N = 220), a short writing task was used to prompt a switch from participants' parent identity to their feminist identity or a repetition of the feminist identity. Findings from the implicit measure revealed no identity activation ‘cost’ in the switch relative to the repeat condition, consistent with previous findings for demographic identities. In contrast, we found evidence for lower self-reported salience of the feminist identity in the switch compared to the repeat condition. Furthermore, Study 2 found little difference in self-rated performance or task difficulty between conditions, indicating that switching identities does not affect self-rated performance. The results illustrate a new paradigm for investigating social identity switching.

Optimistic bias in updating beliefs about climate change longitudinally predicts low pro‐environmental behaviour

We investigated the preregistered hypothesis that an optimistic bias in updating beliefs about climate change (i.e., integrating good news more than bad news) cross-sectionally (N Study 1 = 109) and longitudinally (N Study 2 = 407) predicts self-reported pro-environmental behaviour (PEB). To test this, we employed an experimental task in which participants were presented with multiple climate change scenarios and asked to update their beliefs after receiving scientific evidence. Additionally, we investigated whether biased belief updating and PEB could be altered by brief experimental interventions providing information on different aspects of climate change. Results show that optimistically biased belief updating did not predict PEB cross-sectionally, but did predict PEB 4 weeks later, while controlling for baseline levels of PEB. The experimental interventions did not significantly alter belief updating or increase PEB, although there were significant gender differences. The results suggest that an optimistic bias in belief updating longitudinally predicts low engagement in PEB, possibly because selectively integrating good news over bad news reduces the perceived urgency to take action. Yet the effect may be small and detectable only in sufficiently large samples. The results also indicate that it is challenging to modify this bias. Implications for research on attitude change, social cognition and PEB are discussed.

Capacity versus responsibility: Wealth and historical emissions as determinants of support for climate aid policy

Across both wealthy and non-wealthy nations, research finds public support for wealthy countries taking greater climate action. However, it is unclear whether this is driven by a belief that wealthier nations have greater economic capacity to respond or a greater historic responsibility for causing climate change. We explore this idea in the context of climate aid policies, which direct support to those most affected by climate change. In a correlational study (N = 292, United Kingdom), individuals who believe their nation has greater historic responsibility for climate change showed stronger support for their country providing climate aid. Two experiments provide conflicting findings. In Study 2 (N = 366, United Kingdom), we experimentally manipulated national wealth and historical emissions using a fictional nation paradigm and found that wealth was the stronger predictor of support for their country providing climate aid. In Study 3 (N = 797, South Africa) we manipulated these factors about participants' own nation and found that neither predicted support for climate aid policy, but both predicted greater support for their country implementing climate mitigation policies. Although higher capacity and responsibility increased support for mitigation policies, further efforts are needed to understand their role in shaping support for climate aid.

Social signals of belonging: How the perceived ethnic‐national background of friends affects ascriptions of belonging given to descendants of migrants

Many descendants of migrants feel belonging to both the national group and the ethnic minority group of their family (dual identity), but they often experience that majority members see them only as ethnic minority members. This could hamper their potential to improve intergroup relations. Because social networks tend to be homogeneous, having friends from a particular group could be interpreted as a signal of someone's group belonging. Our research advances the field by examining how the ethnic minority/national majority composition of the friendship network of descendants of migrants may affect the national/dual ascriptions they receive. In two vignette studies, we manipulated the composition of the friend group, using names or AI-generated faces of fictitious Moroccan-Dutch individuals, and examined how this affected ascriptions and stereotypical evaluations given by a representative sample of Dutch majority members. We find mixed results; having Dutch friends increased Dutch ascriptions and having mixed friends increased dual ascriptions when participants read text. However, these effects were attenuated when targets' faces were categorized. This suggests that information about phenotype limits the effects of friend group composition. Future research should examine these dynamics in real-world environments where phenotype and social cues coexist.

A primer on politicization, polarization, radicalization, and activation and their implications for democracy in times of rapid technological change

Governments around the world fear a loss of social cohesion and a risk of harm to individuals and democratic processes that stem from politicization, polarization and radicalization. We argue that these processes of social influence provide the motivation for—but are not sufficient for—mobilization (the behaviour of engaging in collective action). To be able to collectively act, people require the capability and resources to do so, which can be developed during an activation process. We clarify the common and distinct aspects of each process so the common drivers, but unique effects, can be conceptualized and operationalized by policymakers, practitioners and researchers who wish to understand democratic resilience.

Primary and secondary generalization effects from Black and gay contact: Longitudinal evidence of between‐ and within‐person effects

The contact hypothesis stipulates that contact between social groups can reduce intergroup prejudice, implying that contact changes people (i.e., within-person effects). However, recent research suggests that more intergroup contact might simply be associated with less intergroup prejudice (i.e., between-person effects). We explore primary but also secondary contact effects, whereby contact with one outgroup theoretically improves attitudes towards other uninvolved groups. White, heterosexual Americans' contact with Black and gay people was assessed at four timepoints, 3 weeks apart (T1 N = 456; 51.6% women, M age = 46.71, SD = 15.30); multilevel modelling parsed between- from within-person contact effects on intergroup outcomes (attitudes, humanization, collective action intentions). We found consistent evidence of predicted primary contact effects, reflecting both within- and between-subjects relations. For secondary contact, between-subjects gay-to-Black associative generalization was observed: greater contact (quantity and quality) with gay people was observed among those expressing more positive Black intergroup outcomes. Within-subjects secondary effects were primarily observed in terms of assessing contact quantity, where more contact with Black people predicted more positive gay intergroup outcomes downstream (i.e., Black-to-gay process generalization). Contrary to recent concerns, the current study promisingly shows that contact with a primary outgroup can change people in ways that generate positive outcomes towards primary and (some) secondary outgroups.

Believing that social change is possible: Collective efficacy to promote engagement and mobilization of non‐Roma as allies

We analyzed the effect of collective efficacy on mobilizing allies for Roma rights and the role of legitimizing ideologies and perceived discrimination as moderators. In an online experiment, pooling two samples of non-Roma Hungarians (n = 397) and Spaniards (n = 339), participants were randomly assigned to a high (vs. low) efficacy condition and reported their perceived collective efficacy, collective action intentions, and participation for supporting Roma. Pooled analyses showed that participants were more willing to take action in the high (vs. low) efficacy condition, although meritocracy beliefs moderated the effects. In a second study in Slovakia (n = 454), with a control condition, we found indirect effects of the manipulation of collective efficacy, supporting the idea that decreasing perceived collective efficacy predicts lower collective action intentions and participation. In a third study in Hungary (n = 382), we disentangled collective efficacy from social norms and found indirect effects via perceived collective efficacy. Participants in the low efficacy condition (vs. high efficacy or control) perceived less collective efficacy as allies, which in turn was associated with lower collective action. We discuss the conceptualization of collective efficacy in experimental studies and its implications for the mobilization of equality.

‘You can't live in fear all the time’: Affective dilemmas in Youth's discussions on climate change in Norway

Emotional responses to anthropogenic climate change have attracted significant attention. People negotiate emotions through culturally available frameworks. This study, based on 18 focus group discussions, explores in detail three instances of how Norwegian youth engage affectively with climate change. Utilising affect and discourse theory, we conceptualise affective dilemmas as conflicts arising from contradictory expectations made available through discourse. These dilemmas are negotiated through affective-discursive practices. Through a discourse-oriented analysis, we illustrate how ecological distress is interpreted, enacted, and resisted. We identified three key affective-discursive dilemmas: (a) climate anxiety as voluntary versus involuntary, (b) fear as motivation versus a barrier for climate action, and (c) responsibility for climate actions versus self-care. Participants engaged in practices such as (a) purposeful engagement with climate anxiety, (b) detachment from ecological distress, and (c) self-care and staying positive. The study contributes to social psychology by applying affective-discursive theory to understand how youth make sense of and use eco-emotion categories in dialogue. It empirically shows how discussions on ecological issues reflect cultural expectations of self-care and positivity and individualised emotional management. The analysis highlights how socio-cultural imperatives shape youths' emotional responses, which may sideline collective climate action and favour psychological solutions to ecological crises.

Can transformative experiences bridge the gap between receiving communities and formerly incarcerated persons?

The stigma of incarceration contributes to the global reoffending crisis and remains a barrier to reintegration into receiving communities. Recent research suggests that the key to solving this problem may lie in shared transformative experiences. We tested whether the salience of such experiences can overcome stigma among members of receiving communities when they act as gatekeepers for formerly incarcerated persons seeking employment. Across four experimental studies with seven samples of US and UK nationals (N = 2091), we examined the conditions under which transformative experiences can lead to identity fusion, a powerful form of social bonding and contribute to hiring and optimism about reintegration among prospective employers. In six of seven samples, those who reported stronger transformative experiences of their own were more fused to a job applicant, which was linked to positive attitudes towards them and willingness to hire them. Effects of formerly incarcerated persons' experiences varied between national samples and experience contexts: American citizens were more receptive to experiences in prison, while British citizens were more influenced by sports experiences. These findings highlight the potency of transformative experiences to forge connective bridges to stigmatized groups, despite cultural differences in perceptions of relevant social cues about formerly incarcerated people.

The role of perceived self‐transcendence values in forming functional relationships with professionals

Existing research into values and relationship formation highlights the role of individuals' own values or value similarity between the parties. We consider the formation of functional relationships with professionals, which cannot be fully explained by documented value-based mechanisms. Instead, we examine the role of professionals' values as perceived by others. We study two occupations that require forming relationships yet are characterized by opposing value profiles: therapists and managers, who are prototypically high in self-transcendence and self-enhancement values, respectively. We show that: (a) client–therapist and employee–manager relationships are stronger the more the professional is perceived as prioritizing self-transcendence (Study 1, N = 191, USA); (b) perceived self-transcendence of managers contributes to relationship quality beyond employee personal values and employee–manager value similarity (Study 2, N = 177, IL); and (c) perceptions of warmth mediate the link between perceived self-transcendence and relationship formation (Study 3, N = 297, USA). Our discussion further highlights the importance of perceived values.

A golden age of behavioural social psychology? Towards a social psychology of power and intergroup relations in the digital age

This paper explores the idea of a ‘golden age’ in social psychological research. I begin with ‘behavioural social psychology’—research that leverages the behavioural traces that are a product of the digital age. I argue that the ability to analyse digital visual data, natural language data, and smartphone and ambient sensor data, has made substantial contributions to the state of social psychological knowledge. However, social psychology needs to do more than just leverage digital data for psychological benefit. Digital technologies construct and reflect a world that is marked by profound structural inequality and unfairness. Yet social psychology never really considers technology as being ‘world-making’ in its own right. More specifically, social psychology very rarely goes beyond considering what technology might do—to explore the question of who wins and who loses when technologies reshape our worlds. I point to a mosaic of work applying social identity approaches to new technologies as the starting point for a social psychology that engages with power and resistance in the digital age. Social psychology will not enter a truly golden age until we engage not only with the data, but also with the power structures of digital technology.

Ni justo ni legítimo: The role of social status and neoliberal context on perceived social justice in Latin America and its political consequences

We study the role of social status and neoliberal contexts on perceptions of social justice and their consequences for political behaviour in Latin America. While most literature measures these perceptions through personal assessments of income distribution fairness, we resort to a wider understanding including perceptions of fairness on access to fundamental rights. Using data from the Latinobarómetro 2020 survey (N ≈ 20,204), we find that perceived social justice involves assessments of income inequality and access to education, health and justice. Based on self-interest theory, we expect higher-status individuals to perceive the world as more just, as this perception aligns with their interests. We also argue that neoliberal contexts moderate this relationship by narrowing justice perception gaps across status groups, as these contexts advance ideologies emphasizing individual responsibility and meritocracy. Regression models suggest that social status, measured through three indicators (social class, socioeconomic status, and subjective income) is positively related to perceived social justice. Interaction models suggest that, in more neoliberal societies, differences in perceived social justice among social status groups tend to narrow. Finally, we find that perceived social justice is associated with satisfaction with life, democracy and economic system, and reduced intention to participate in protests.

‘Disabled joy is resistance’: Insights and recommendations from social psychology on reducing ableism

Ableism, encompassing discrimination and social oppression of disabled people, which results in their marginalization, persists as a significant global barrier to equity and inclusion. This paper explores how social psychological research can inform strategies to combat ableism by analysing the social processes that underlie ableist attitudes and actions. Social Identity Theory speaks to the role of identity in countering the marginalization of disabled people, while the Stereotype Content Model helps us to understand the origins of the stigma often attached to ‘disability’. Research in these two fields is reviewed alongside discursive research in social psychology, to determine how to work towards a more anti-ableist society. Based on my experience as a social psychologist and disabled person, and by integrating theoretical insights with practical applications, this paper advocates for a multi-level social psychological approach to building anti-ableist spaces, emphasizing educational and social policy recommendations

Issue Information

‘Nothing to lose or a world to win’: Reconsidering efficacy, legitimacy, political trust and repression in confrontational collective action

Confrontational collective actions are neither uncontrolled outbursts of initially pacifist resistance nor mere reactions to helplessness and lack of viable political options. Instead, they serve strategically determined purposes within the group, making them perceived as both effective and legitimate. Regardless of whether it is more or less confrontational, examining the role of efficacy and legitimacy of actions that are committed to achieving group goals is crucial for understanding the appeal of collective action strategies. We examined the role of political trust and protest repression in predicting the legitimacy of protest violence and the perceived efficacy of confrontational and non-confrontational collective actions and, in turn, their role in confrontational collective action. Across three correlational studies conducted in Germany, Turkey and the United Kingdom (N = 3833), the legitimacy of protest violence and the efficacy of confrontational tactics were core determinants of confrontational collective actions. While low political trust did not directly predict confrontational action, it predicted heightened protest repression and the legitimacy of protest violence. Our findings challenge the nothing-to-lose hypothesis by demonstrating that confrontational actions are not driven by the low efficacy of non-confrontational strategies or low political trust, and people may perceive both confrontational and non-confrontational actions as similarly effective.

Editorial Acknowledgement