Collective Action Intentions Research Articles

Collective angst and group continuity as predictors of collective action for progressive city policies

Paweł Adamowicz, the liberal mayor of Gdańsk, Poland, died on January 14, 2019, after being stabbed by a man who rushed onstage during a charity event. Four studies were carried out to analyze the predictors of willingness to engage in collective action in support of the progressive city policies he initiated. In Study 1 ( N = 214), collective angst was related to collective action intention. Identification with Gdańsk mediated this relation. In the next two studies, we tested the role of the perceived continuity of the in-group. The relationship between collective angst and willingness to support collective actions was mediated by perceived essentialist continuity of the group (Study 2, on snap election day, N = 121). Moreover, results confirmed that collective angst predicted strength of identification with Gdańsk. This identification was related to the perceived essentialist continuity of the group, which in turn was linked to willingness to engage in collective actions in support of progressive policies (Study 3, N = 98). In Study 4 ( N = 456), conducted within a few days before the presidential election in Poland, we replicated the model of mediation obtained in Study 3, and showed that contextualized collective angst also predicted collective action intentions.

An Examination of the Social Identity Model of Collective Action in the Context of Vietnam

Introduction: Although collective action relating to land and environmental disputes in Vietnam has been increasing over the past decades, there is little research from the perspective of social psychology on this topic. Objective: This study was conducted to examine the applicability of the social identity model of collective action [SIMCA] in the context of Vietnam. Specifically, we assessed the predictive powers of moral conviction, politicized identity, group-based anger, and group efficacy on people’s intentions to engage in collective action in a situation where people from three communes of Hanoi blocked garbage trucks to enter a waste treatment complex located in this area. Methods: The participants were 132 residents from these communes. We collected the data by a self-report survey and then executed regression and path analyses to test our hypotheses. Results and Discussion: The results indicated that, except for group efficacy, variables in SIMCA were capable of independently predicting intentions to participate in collective action. Also, politicized identity had directly and indirectly positive effects on collective action intentions through group-based anger but not group efficacy. Politicized identity and group-based anger played partial mediating roles in the relationship between moral conviction and collective action intentions. Conclusion: These findings partly supporting the proposed SIMCA demonstrated the impacts of Vietnam's unique cultural and political characteristics on individuals' engagement in collective action relating to land and environmental disputes between people and their local authorities.

The Greta Thunberg Effect: Familiarity with Greta Thunberg predicts intentions to engage in climate activism in the United States

AbstractDespite Greta Thunberg's popularity, research has yet to investigate her impact on the public's willingness to take collective action on climate change. Using cross‐sectional data from a nationally representative survey of U.S. adults (N = 1,303), we investigate the “Greta Thunberg Effect,” or whether exposure to Greta Thunberg predicts collective efficacy and intentions to engage in collective action. We find that those who are more familiar with Greta Thunberg have higher intentions of taking collective actions to reduce global warming and that stronger collective efficacy beliefs mediate this relationship. This association between familiarity with Greta Thunberg, collective efficacy beliefs, and collective action intentions is present even after accounting for respondents’ overall support for climate activism. Moderated mediation models testing age and political ideology as moderators of the “Greta Thunberg Effect” indicate that although the indirect effect of familiarity with Greta Thunberg via collective efficacy is present across all age‐groups, and across the political spectrum, it may be stronger among those who identify as more liberal (than conservative). Our findings suggest that young public figures like Greta Thunberg may motivate collective action across the U.S. public, but their effect may be stronger among those with a shared political ideology. Implications for future research and for broadening climate activists’ appeals across the political spectrum are discussed.

Exposure to victim portrayals: the role of multiple emotions in influencing collective action intentions for environmental justice

Environmental justice is a complex issue requiring joint efforts from various actors, including collective action from the general public. Echoing an urgent call for greater attention to environmental justice in the field of environmental communication, the current research examined one possible way to motivate collective action for environmental justice, that is, via the portrayals of victims and the emotions the portrayals convey. An experiment with a 2 (victim’s photo: presence vs. absence) × 2 (industry’s intent: presence vs. absence) between-subjects factorial design was conducted. The results show that emotions, including moral outrage, compassion, and distress, mediated the effects of the photo condition on collective action intentions. These findings contribute to the literature by connecting victim portrayals with collective action, expanding the array of message-induced emotions in predicting collective action, and furthering the investigation of collective action in the environmental justice context.

Social Identification in Collective Climate Activism: Predicting Participation in the Environmental Movement, Extinction Rebellion

ABSTRACT Human-induced climate change poses an unprecedented global threat. Researchers agree that dealing with climate change requires international collective action and widespread social transformation. This study integrates insights from the Social Identity Model of Collective Action (SIMCA) and the Encapsulated Model of Social Identity in Collective Action (EMSICA) to explain participation in the environmental movement, Extinction Rebellion (XR). Structural equation models of data from a survey of 203 current or potential XR activists supported two identity-based pathways to collective action behavior and future intentions: moral convictions → anger → XR identification → collective action and global identification → participative efficacy → XR identification → collective action. Perceived group efficacy predicted collective action intentions but not behavior. Fear, guilt/shame, and hope did not significantly predict collective action behavior or intentions. We discuss the interplay of personal and social identity processes underlying climate change activism, as well as the need for longitudinal and experimental studies to disentangle causal relations. We propose that environmental campaign groups could foster group identification and thence collective action by communicating moral outrage about climate change, together with the potential efficacy of individuals’ actions toward achieving the group’s goals.

Tweeting about sexism motivates further activism: A social identity perspective.

Women, more so than men, are using social media activism to respond to sexism. However, when they do, they are also faced with gendered criticisms 'hashtag feminism' that may instead serve to silence them. Based on social identity theory, this research examined how women's social media activism, in response to sexism, may be a first step towards further activism. Two studies used a simulated Twitter paradigm to expose women to sexism and randomly assign them to either tweet in response, or to a no-tweet control condition. Both studies found support for a serial mediation model such that tweeting out after sexism strengthened social identity, which in turn increased collective action intentions, and in turn, behavioural collective actions. Study 2 further showed that validation from others increases the indirect effect of tweeting on behavioural collective action through collective action intentions, but group efficacy did not moderate any indirect effects. It was concluded that social media activism in response to sexism promotes an enactment of women's social identity, thereby mobilizing them to further action.

How intergroup contact and communication about group differences predict collective action intentions among advantaged groups

Though greater intergroup contact has been shown to predict greater support for social change among advantaged group members, little is known about what occurs during the contact that may encourage members of advantaged groups to become willing to engage in collective action in solidarity with the disadvantaged. We argue that intergroup contact with disadvantaged group members may motivate advantaged group members’ willingness to engage in collective action through the mediating pathway of communication about group differences in power during contact. Two studies tested this proposition by examining how advantaged group members communicate about group differences with disadvantaged groups during contact in two distinct national contexts: White Americans in contact with Black Americans in the U.S. (Study 1) and Turks in contact with Kurds in Turkey (Study 2). In addition, Study 2 extended the research by specifying that it is communication about group differences in power—not communication about group differences in culture—that mediates the relation between advantaged group members’ contact with the disadvantaged and their willingness to engage in collective action in solidarity with the disadvantaged. We discuss the implications of these findings for future research on intergroup contact, along with highlighting the importance of communicating about power differences across group lines.

May the odds be ever in your favor: The Hunger Games and the fight for a more equal society. (Negative) Media vicarious contact and collective action

AbstractVarious studies have found that reading books about positive interactions between ingroup and outgroup characters, known as media vicarious contact, can reduce prejudice. Focusing on the fantasy saga of The Hunger Games, we examined the effects of negative vicarious contact on collective action across two studies. Specifically, we tested whether reading about fantasy characters living in a postapocalyptic conflictual society with large social disparities between advantaged and disadvantaged groups leads advantaged group members to display greater willingness to engage in collective action on behalf of the disadvantaged group. Results from Study 1 (correlational survey in the United Kingdom and United States) and Study 2 (experimental intervention in Italy) revealed that reading The Hunger Games is indirectly associated with greater collective action intentions via increased anger toward injustice. In both studies social dominance orientation (SDO) acted as a moderator, but in opposite directions: mediation was significant for low‐SDOs in Study 1, and for high‐SDOs in Study 2. Results are discussed in relation to the importance of media vicarious contact via book reading for social change, and to the need to identify the contextual conditions allowing to anticipate the specific moderation pattern that is more likely to emerge.

The Power of Political Déjà Vu: When Collective Action Becomes an Effort to Change the Future by Preventing the Return of the Past

This article examines the conditions under which political déjà vu (PDV), a perceived analogy between past and present societal‐level traumatic events, can mobilize people to support system‐changing collective action. We propose that individuals' perceptions of PDV can evolve both social identification with a group that sustains the victimized and disidentification with the perceived perpetrators. We further suggest that disidentification and identification can form two distinct psychological paths to collective action through the sequential effects of moral outrage and collective efficacy beliefs. We tested these ideas in a cross‐sectional field study (N = 272) in the context of antigovernment protests over a missing activist in Argentina, a country with a legacy of enforced disappearances. The findings demonstrated that perceiving two events from different times as similar simultaneously predicted identifying as a supporter of the victimized and disidentifying with the perceived wrongdoer. Disidentification was found to predict collective action intentions through the sequential effect of collective efficacy beliefs and moral outrage, whereas the indirect effect of social identification was nonsignificant. Results provide an intriguing example of the effects of perceived PDV in social mobilization and extend our understanding of disidentification as a powerful predictor of collective action.

Pity for economically disadvantaged groups motivates donation and ally collective action intentions

AbstractWe argue that pity can motivate collective action intentions toward groups that are both politically and economically deprived. We tested this connection in four online surveys and an experiment. In Study 1 (N = 1,007), pity for the Roma in Hungary predicted collective action intentions, which was replicated in Study 2 in connection with refugees in Germany (N = 191) and in Hungary (N = 563). Study 3 (N = 475) demonstrated that for not economically but politically disadvantaged groups (e.g., sexual minorities), pity was not a predictor of ally action. In an experiment (Study 4, N = 447), pity was just as strong a predictor of collective action intentions as outrage on behalf of an economically and politically disadvantaged outgroup. Pity can be a mobilizing emotion when it comes to groups that are both economically and politically disadvantaged; however, outrage remains more important in the absence of economic hardship.

Country‐level and individual‐level predictors of men's support for gender equality in 42 countries

AbstractMen sometimes withdraw support for gender equality movements when their higher gender status is threatened. Here, we expand the focus of this phenomenon by examining it cross‐culturally, to test if both individual‐ and country‐level variables predict men's collective action intentions to support gender equality. We tested a model in which men's zero‐sum beliefs about gender predict reduced collective action intentions via an increase in hostile sexism. Because country‐level gender equality may threaten men's higher gender status, we also examined whether the path from zero‐sum beliefs to collective action intentions was stronger in countries higher in gender equality. Multilevel modeling on 6,734 men from 42 countries supported the individual‐level mediation model, but found no evidence of moderation by country‐level gender equality. Both country‐level gender equality and individual‐level zero‐sum thinking independently predicted reductions in men's willingness to act collectively for gender equality.

Being moved by protest: Collective efficacy beliefs and injustice appraisals enhance collective action intentions for forest protection via positive and negative emotions

Based on collective action theories and appraisal theories of emotion, we propose that people are moved and positively overwhelmed by the idea that together they can make a difference for a more sustainable future and that these feelings motivate them to participate in pro-environmental collective action. We surveyed activists and sympathizers of a forest protection campaign (Study 1, N = 210) and conducted an experiment (Study 2, N = 221) to test this claim. As expected, feelings of being moved mediated the effect of collective efficacy beliefs on collective action intentions in both studies. Hence, being moved constitutes a second emotional path to collective action alongside group-based anger. These two emotional paths differently elicited the goal to punish authorities (intergroup goal), to be part of the movement (intragroup goal), and to reduce climate change (ideological goal). The findings suggest that negative and positive emotions (anger and being moved) amplify already existing motivations.

Standing up for whom? Targets’ different goals in the confrontation of discrimination

AbstractWe challenge the common interpretation of targets’ immediate confrontation in reaction to discrimination as self‐serving behavior and propose different underlying motivations for this phenomenon. In five online scenario studies (Noverall = 1,447), we demonstrate across different samples and contexts that targets indicate a distinct pursuit of the following self‐reported confrontation goals: individual‐benefit (e.g., perpetrator apologizes); group‐benefit (e.g., prejudice reduction); and distancing (e.g., demonstrating that one is different from typical group members). Furthermore, meaningful associations of the pursuits of individual‐benefitting goals and group‐benefitting goals with group identification, disidentification, and further collective action intentions indicate that they represent different confrontation motivations: Individual‐benefitting confrontation serves to cope with the individual mistreatment of discrimination, whereas group‐benefitting confrontation represents a form of collective action. Distancing goals were associated with disidentification and—unexpectedly—group identification. Our results show that the phenomenon of confrontation in reaction to discrimination can be the result of different underlying psychological processes.

Forum theater can improve intergroup attitudes, sense of community, and collective action intentions: Evidence from Liberia.

Forum theater can improve intergroup attitudes, sense of community, and collective action intentions: Evidence from Liberia.

Testing the impact of images in environmental campaigns

Images are commonly used in environmental advocacy campaigns that are designed to promote collective action. However, the effects of different types of images have rarely been examined. In three experiments (combined N = 1426), we tested the impact of commonly used campaign images (meeting, protest, or no image) on willingness to engage in collective action against coal mining. Further, we examined whether images influence known drivers of collective action. Results support the Social Identity Model of Collective Action in environmental contexts: efficacy, identification and anger were strongly associated with collective action intentions and (less so) behaviour. Identification was the strongest predictor of actual behaviour. The effects of images were inconsistent. Image presence and type sometimes affected collective action responses, either directly or indirectly. The presence of an image sometimes increased perceptions of descriptive norms for action, which in turn increased perceived efficacy and collective action intentions.

The influence of message framing on public beliefs and behaviors related to species reintroduction

Little is known about whether messaging strategies drawing from behavioral science theory may effectively change public attitudes, beliefs, and behavior with regard to biodiversity conservation. We conducted a randomized survey experiment with 1415 Colorado residents to examine how messaging approaches influence beliefs, voting intentions, and collective action intentions related to a proposed ballot initiative mandating wolf reintroduction to the state. We tested 6 different messages that drew from behavioral science literature on extreme versus moderate appeals, anthropomorphism, and perceived social norms. We find that overall, message framing has little impact on Coloradans’ intentions to vote for or against wolf reintroduction. We find preliminary evidence that extreme arguments that do not address ranchers’ concerns may decrease the willingness of individuals with neutral attitudes to share positive information about wolf reintroduction with others. Furthermore, moderate arguments discussing how ranchers’ concerns will be addressed reduce intentions to engage in organized opposition to reintroduction (compared to arguments used by those opposed to wolf reintroduction). We find that providing descriptive normative information changes perceptions of norms regarding wolf reintroduction, but such changed perceptions do not lead to changes in behavioral intentions compared to control messages. Our study suggests that to increase the diffusion of positive information about a conservation program and prevent organized opposition, conservation practitioners should avoid extreme arguments that ignore the concerns of the opposition and utilize more moderate arguments that acknowledge and address those concerns.

Zero‐sum beliefs shape advantaged allies’ support for collective action

AbstractThree studies (N1 = 1,019;N2 = 312;N3 = 494) tested whether seeing intergroup relations as inherently antagonistic shaped advantaged social groups’ allyship intentions. More specifically, we tested whether endorsingzero‐sum beliefsrelated to their willingness to support system‐challenging and system‐supporting collective action. Zero‐sum beliefs were negatively correlated with system‐challenging and positively correlated with system‐supporting collective action intentions. Zero‐sum beliefs were more common among advantaged than disadvantaged groups and translated into lower allyship intentions. Advantaged group members with higher levels of zero‐sum beliefs were also more likely to experience anger and fear when considering the demographic racial shift in the United States. Increased fear was associated with greater support for system‐supporting and lower support for system‐challenging collective action. We find consistent evidence that advantaged group members see intergroup relations as a zero‐sum game and that these beliefs are negatively related to their intentions to become allies.

Imagining better societies: A social psychological framework for the study of utopian thinking and collective action

AbstractWe present an integrative theoretical model that specifies social psychological mechanisms by which utopian thinking, which activates the social imagination, may enhance collective action intentions oriented toward social change and human progress. The model synthesizes complementary insights from interdisciplinary research programs on utopianism, hope, construal level, and system justification to identify mechanisms by which imagining better societies: (a) increases social hope, (b) yields an abstract mindset that bridges the psychological distance between the status quo (“here and now”) and a better possible future, (c) decreases system justification motivation, and (d) promotes social justice‐oriented forms of collective action.

Psychological Quality of Life in People with Physical Disability: The Effect of Internalized Stigma, Collective Action and Resilience.

Purpose: The main objective of this study was to examine the role of social identification, collective action and resilience in reducing the negative consequences of internalized stigma on the psychological quality of life of people with physical disability using path analysis. We propose a model with two paths: the first through social identification and collective action and the second via resilience. Method: A total of 288 Spanish people with physical disability aged between 18 and 82 years (46.4% males; mean [SD] of age = 45.1 [12.3] responded to the questionnaire. Data were collected for three months through an online survey. Results: The tested model adequately fit the data. We found that the relationship between internalized stigma and the psychological quality of life of people with physical disability was mediated by resilience. However, neither social identification nor collective action mediated the association between internalized stigma and quality of life among our participants. Conclusions: The results confirmed the negative association between internalized stigma and quality of life in the population with physical disability. The results show that some interactive processes, such as resilience, may contribute to decreasing the negative effects of internalized stigma. In contrast, no effects of identification with the group or collective action intention were found.

Supplemental Material for Forum Theater Can Improve Intergroup Attitudes, Sense of Community, and Collective Action Intentions: Evidence From Liberia

Supplemental Material for Forum Theater Can Improve Intergroup Attitudes, Sense of Community, and Collective Action Intentions: Evidence From Liberia