Intergroup Emotions Research Articles

Angry and Afraid: Exploring the Impact of Mixed Emotional Reactions to Hate Crimes With LGBT+ and Muslim Communities.

Hate crimes send messages of intolerance that can cause significant emotional and behavioral harm to entire identity groups. Previous research, based on intergroup emotions theory, has helped explain the psychological mechanisms that underpin the indirect effects of anti-LGBT+ hate crime, showing that incidents give rise to perceptions of threat among community members, which in turn elicit certain emotional reactions that trigger specific behavioral outcomes. This article provides two significant contributions to this developing knowledgebase. First, it provides an important replication of the theoretical model with another frequently targeted community: Muslim people. In addition, it offers the first quantitative analysis of how combinations of different emotions trigger discrete behavioral responses in the aftermath of hate crime, thereby providing much-needed nuance to the intergroup emotions theory model. Across two studies (Study 1: N = 589 LGBT+ participants; Study 2: N = 347 Muslim participants), we show that, for both LGBT+ and Muslim participants, indirect experiences of hate crimes are associated with greater perceptions of threat, which are then positively associated with anger, anxiety, and shame, that link to behavioral intentions: avoidance, pro-action, security behaviors, and retaliation. Latent class analyses further revealed that participants' emotional reactions tend to cluster into four distinct profiles in both communities: people scored mid-range on all emotions, or high anger with low shame, or high anger with high anxiety, or low shame. These combinations had direct implications for intended behaviors across both groups: experiencing high anger with high anxiety was a cogent motivator of action. Most significantly, we provide new insights into how and why different emotions interact to predict both similar and divergent behaviors in the aftermath of hate crime incidents. Our findings yield important new knowledge that holds the potential of shaping both public policies and practices aimed at addressing the impacts of hate crimes.

When political elites talk, citizens reply. Affective polarization through temporal orientation and intergroup emotions

When political elites talk, citizens reply. Affective polarization through temporal orientation and intergroup emotions

UGC’s self-deprecation humor and sustainable brand support attitude on social media: expansion of the perspective of affective events theory

ABSTRACT Utilising User Generated Content (UGC) on social media platforms like TikTok and Facebook can establish genuine connections between content creators and their audience. However, managing and maintaining long-term brand development remains a significant challenge. Research on the mechanisms behind sustainable brand support attitudes towards UGC is limited. This paper explores whether a self-deprecating style of humour affects audiences’ sustained brand support attitudes towards social media content creators. Theoretically, this study combines Affective Events Theory (AET) and Intergroup Emotion Theory (IET) to explore how individual attitudes extend to group reactions and the sustainability of personal brands. It aims to thoroughly investigate, in the context of social media, the cognitive and emotional changes in individuals towards themselves and their groups under the stimulus of UGC self-deprecating humour, as well as the process of forming sustainable brand support attitudes. Methodologically, this study employs a covariance-based structural equation model to establish the path mechanism of self-deprecating humour expression on sustainable brand support attitudes at both individual psychology and group attitude levels. Additionally, it analyzes the limitations of self-deprecating humour in UGC, considering users with varying levels of need for cognition. Lastly, the paper discusses the theoretical contributions and practical implications of this study.

How can previous intergroup contact predict willingness for intergroup interaction? The mediating role of specific intergroup emotions

AbstractPrior research recognizes intergroup emotions as crucial for intergroup attitudes and interactions, but the psychological mechanisms linking prior intergroup interactions to contact intentions remain incompletely understood. This study investigated the joint effects and interplay of Chinese students' positive and negative contact on behavioural intentions to interact with international students in the future. Six affective variables (fear, anger, anxiety, empathy, happiness, and trust) were tested as mediators. Results revealed that positive contact directly predicted stronger contact willingness and indirectly affected this variable through lower levels of fear, anger, and anxiety and higher levels of empathy, happiness, and trust. Negative contact, however, was negatively associated with positive emotions and contact willingness and predicted more negative emotions. All intergroup emotions played significant mediating roles in the relationship between intergroup contact and willingness for future contact, and anxiety, fear, and trust emerged as robust mediators. Notably, positive contact had larger effects as compared to negative contact. Moreover, no association was observed between negative contact and intergroup emotions when positive contact was frequent. However, when both positive and negative contact were at higher levels, positive contact emerged as a more influential predictor of all intergroup emotions. This research emphasizes examining both positive and negative contact and affective variables as contact mediators, shedding light on enhancing contact intentions.

Application of the integrated threat theory to conservation law enforcement.

Interactions between law enforcement agents in conservation (e.g., rangers) and illegal resource users (e.g., illegal hunters) can be violent and sometimes fatal, which negatively affects conservation efforts and people's well-being. Models from social psychology, such as integrated threat theory (ITT) (intergroup interactions shape intergroup emotions, prejudices and perceived threats leading to hostile attitudes or behaviors between groups), are useful in addressing such interactions. Conservation approaches relying mainly on law enforcement have never been investigated using this framework. Using a structured questionnaire, we collected data from 282 rangers in protected and unprotected areas (n=50) in northern Iran. We applied Bayesian structural equation modeling in an assessment of rangers' affective attitudes (i.e., emotions or feelings that shape attitudes toward a person or object) toward illegal hunters in an ITT framework. Rangers' positive perceptions of illegal hunters were negatively associated with intergroup anxiety (emotional response to fear) and negative stereotypes about a hunter's personality, which mediated the relationship between negative contact and affective attitudes. This suggests that negative contact, such as verbal abuse, may lead rangers to perceive illegal hunters as arrogant or cruel, which likely forms a basis for perceived threats. Rangers' positive contact with illegal hunters, such as playing or working together, likely lowered their perceived realistic threats (i.e., fear of property damage). Perceived realistic threats of rangers were positively associated with negative contacts (e.g., physical harm). The associations we identified suggest that relationships based on positive interactions between rangers and illegal hunters can reduce fear and prejudice. Thus, we suggest that rangers and hunters be provided with safe spaces to have positive interactions, which may help lower tension and develop cooperative conservation mechanisms.

The power of words and voices: The role of direct and vicarious contact (text vs. audio modalities) in reducing anti-Chinese prejudice

The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated anti-Chinese sentiments, demonstrating an urgent need for effective prejudice reduction interventions. Study 1 tested the relationship between contact and prejudice and its mediators toward Chinese people in Australia ( N = 362). As predicted, positive contact was significantly associated with less prejudice and, reliably, intergroup anxiety had the strongest mediation effect in this relationship. In Study 2, European Australians ( N = 161) were randomly assigned to an intergroup or intragroup (control) contact interaction, delivered vicariously via audio or text. As hypothesized, vicarious intergroup contact significantly reduced prejudice and negative emotions toward Chinese people. Moreover, text-based vicarious contact led to significantly lower intergroup anxiety and negative intergroup emotions than audio-based contact. No interaction effects of vicarious contact and delivery mode were found. Overall, these studies support direct and vicarious text-based contact as effective strategies for reducing prejudice in a global crisis and improving attitudes toward Chinese people.

‘We despair’: Examining the role of political despair for collective action and well‐being

AbstractAnecdotally, people often report feeling despair about the political status quo. We conceptualise these feelings as political despair. But what is political despair, and what are its effects? We adapt intergroup emotion theory to analyse political despair in the context of racial inequality (Studies 1 and 2) and climate change (Study 3). Three cross‐sectional studies (total N = 866) tested the measurement of political despair (relative to anger and hope), its pattern of appraisals and outcomes for conventional and radical actions along with well‐being (stress, burnout and optimism). Structural equation modelling differentiated political despair from anger and hope and found that despair is associated with evaluations that the situation is both illegitimate and intractable (unchangeable). Moreover, political despair consistently had a negative relationship with well‐being and positive relationships with conventional and radical collective action. The results suggest political despair is negatively associated with well‐being and impact people's engagement in action for social change.

The violent turn in non‐violent collective action: What happens?

AbstractCollective actions (e.g., protest marches, social movements) that begin peacefully sometimes turn into violent clashes between demonstrators and police, with alarming consequences. Research on the violent turn, informed by intergroup social psychology and micro‐sociology, has made significant but separate advances. We review them jointly to form an integrated, fuller understanding of the violent turn and promote interdisciplinary dialogue by discussing their respective strengths and identifying areas where they complement each other. For these purposes we first extract from the psychology of interpersonal aggression literature a three‐phase temporal pattern of aggression escalation to provide a common reference for reviewing representative studies and theories in intergroup social psychology (e.g., elaborated social identity model of crowd rioting, intergroup emotions theory) and micro‐sociology (e.g., micro‐sociological theory of violence, emotional dynamics and behavioural dynamics). The results of our analysis show a sequence of events beginning from instigators and their impellance in the early phase of the violent turn, psychological transformations forming a proclivity to aggress in the middle phase, and collective empowerment that disinhibits violence in the late phase. Group power and, to a less extent, group emotions permeate all phases. The sequence of events reveals transitional points where intervention may be applied to avert or abort violence.

Integrative emotion regulation relates to sympathy and support for outgroups-Independent of situational outgroup behaviour.

Intergroup emotions powerfully shape intergroup relations. Anger and fear fuel, while hope and sympathy reduce intergroup strife. This implies that emotion regulation may play an important role in improving intergroup relations. Broadening the scope of prior research, we herein investigate the potential benefits of integrative emotion regulation for improving intergroup relations. Integrative emotion regulation involves actively paying attention to emotions to determine which information they provide. Interindividual differences in the use of integrative emotion regulation correlate with sympathy and supportiveness towards outgroups, but why this is the case is unclear. We tested two possible explanations: a person effect (i.e., interindividual differences in integrative emotion regulation shape respondents' general outlook on outgroups) and a person-situation interaction effect (i.e., integrative emotion regulation reduces the impact of situational factors that would typically dampen sympathy, thereby shaping situation-specific responses to outgroups). In four experiments (total N = 984), we manipulated outgroup behaviour and measured interindividual differences in integrative emotion regulation. We found no interaction between integrative emotion regulation and outgroup behaviour in predicting outgroup-directed sympathy and supportiveness. Instead, integrative emotion regulation consistently correlated positively with supportiveness, mediated by sympathy. These findings suggest that those high in integrative emotion regulation have a more positive, general outlook on outgroups than those low in integrative emotion regulation, but being high in integrative emotion does not alter situational responses.

Factors impacting fertility anxiety among Chinese young women with marital status differences

BackgroundChina's societal and cultural significance placed on female fertility and the changing roles of women can lead to fertility anxiety in both married and unmarried women. This anxiety is shaped by factors such as social media use, intergroup emotions, fertility risk perceptions, and national policies. This study examines the interplay of these factors in understanding fertility anxiety among Chinese women. MethodsThis study surveyed 607 young Chinese women using the Fertility Anxiety Scale developed by Zhang and Zhao. Mplus software was used for latent class analysis of respondents' fertility anxiety. A three-step approach with multinomial logistic regression was used to explore factors influencing fertility anxiety among married and unmarried women. ResultsThe latent class analysis supported a two-category model: “high fertility anxiety” (65.70 % married, 53.70 % unmarried) and “low fertility anxiety” (34.30 % married, 46.30 % unmarried). Multinomial logistic regression showed that increased social media usage intensity and perception of health-family risks correlated with higher fertility anxiety in both married and unmarried women. Among unmarried women, intergroup emotions and perceptions of occupational-economic risks also influenced fertility anxiety. Attention to national policies did not significantly impact fertility anxiety among young women. ConclusionThis study sheds light on the complex interplay of societal and individual factors in shaping fertility anxiety among young Chinese women. It underscores the enduring cultural significance placed on female fertility and the evolving roles of women in modern China. Regardless of their marital status, both married and unmarried women experience fertility anxiety, highlighting the pervasiveness of this concern.

The emotional citizen: Positive affective response towards immigrants predicts meaningful experiences with them and lower COVID-19 perceived threat in nine countries

Mass migration and COVID-19 represent two converging challenges affecting immigrant-receiving countries. Our understanding of intergroup emotion profiles—positive (happiness, hope, and sympathy) and negative (anger, fear, and disgust)—among members of immigrant destination societies in times of global uncertainty remains limited. Drawing from panel samples from nine countries ( N = 13,645), and controlling for relevant covariates, we aimed to extract latent profiles of intergroup emotions and map these profiles onto perceived COVID-19-related threats, immigrant contact, political predispositions, dark triad traits, and prejudice. We identified six latent profiles with patterns suggesting that positive interactions with immigrants are significantly correlated with positive emotional response and lower perceived pandemic threat. Societies facing mass immigration in the wake of COVID-19 may benefit from interventions and policies that promote positive and close experiences with immigrants, thereby reducing negative emotions and fostering positive emotions toward newcomers among citizens.

Consequences of affective polarization: Avoidance, intolerance and support for violence in the United Kingdom and Norway

AbstractAffective polarization – that is, antipathy towards political opponents – sits high on the academic and political agenda. This is because it is thought to have a multitude of damaging consequences, both for how citizens view and approach each other and for how they relate to the political system. This study investigates some of the most mentioned and worrying potential consequences of affective polarization at the individual level. Zooming in on Europe, it sheds light on the substantive relationship between partisan antipathy and three kinds of norm‐breaking escalation in the form of avoidance, intolerance and support for violence against party supporters. Methodologically, it unpacks the affective component of polarization, testing to what extent the traditional feeling thermometer performs as a predictor of these three potential outcomes. It then tests alternative expectations of the antecedents of such escalation derived from the intergroup emotions’ literature and the study of political radicalization. This is done using a broad range of both established and new survey items fielded in nationally representative panels between May and November 2020 in two contexts that score relatively low (Norway) and high (the United Kingdom) on affective polarization. They reveal that avoidance, intolerance and support for political violence can be validly measured, and are manifest, in these two European countries, but that they are only weakly correlated to mere dislike of the outgroup. Instead, more severe forms of norm‐breaking escalation depend on the specific nature of the discrete emotions induced beyond dislike (anger, fear or disgust) and are rooted in factors such as relative deprivation, Manicheanism, and dark personality traits (psychopathy, Machiavellianism and narcissism). We discuss the implications for the way polarization is theorized and measured.

Social Identity Signaling in Public Relations: Job Pursuit Intention among Students With Marginalized Racial and Ethnic Identities and Queer Identities

ABSTRACT This study is one of the first research investigations that examined the effectiveness of DEI cues on a fictitious public relations agency’s website in attracting early-career practitioners with marginalized racial and ethnic identities and queer identities by conducting a 2 (identify as marginalized or not) x 2 (high or low DEI cues) between-subject online experiment. By integrating social identity theory, intergroup emotions theory, and signaling theory, the present study provides an overview of the cognitive and affective process underlying how public relations students perceive DEI cues and evaluate a workplace. This study highlights the importance of DEI efforts and communication of such efforts and provides critical social-psychological insights for public relations research.

Intergroup emotions and intergroup attitudes in post-apartheid South Africa

This article investigates the relationships among intergroup emotions and intergroup attitudes among three South African ethno-linguistic groups. The sample included 1 658 respondents (350 Afrikaans-speaking white South Africans; 526 English-speaking white South Africans; and 782 black South African respondents). They completed surveys on intergroup attitudes and group-based emotions of pride, anger, disgust, fear, pity and envy. Multiple linear regression analyses were employed to investigate predictors of outgroup attitudes. The results indicate that attitudes of younger black South Africans were more negative towards Afrikaans-speaking white South Africans. Ingroup pride predicted more positive outgroup attitudes for all groups. Disgust predicted the more negative outgroup attitudes for all groups, while anger predicted more negative white South Africans’ attitudes towards black South Africans. Fear was negatively associated with black South Africans’ attitudes towards English-speaking white South Africans, while outgroup pity predicted more positive white South Africans’ attitudes towards black South Africans and black South Africans’ attitudes towards English-speaking white South Africans. The study confirms tenets of intergroup emotion theory that intergroup emotions serve a regulating function in intergroup attitudes and behaviour.

The connections between personality, ideology and (counter-)empathic emotions depend on the target.

Examine the group-specific connections between personality, ideology, and the moral emotions of empathy and schadenfreude. Empathy and schadenfreude are emotions that often lead to moral prosocial or spiteful harmful behaviors respectively. An outstanding question is what motivates feelings of empathy and schadenfreude towards people from different groups. Here we examine two prominent motivators of emotions: personality traits and ideology. Previous work has found that people's ideological orientations towards respecting traditionalism (RWA) and preferences about group-based hierarchy (SDO) can impact intergroup emotions. Further, personality traits of low agreeableness, low openness, and high conscientiousness uniquely engender SDO and RWA. In the research presented here (Study 1 n = 492; Study 2 n = 786), we examine the relationships between personality traits, ideology, and emotions for groups that are perceived to be dangerous and competitive. We hypothesize that SDO and RWA will relate to reduced empathy and increased schadenfreude but towards unique groups. SDO will relate to reduced empathy and increased schadenfreude towards competitive, low-status groups while RWA will relate to reduced empathy and increased schadenfreude towards threatening groups. We further extend past work by investigating left-wing authoritarianism as well. We find broad support for our expectation that the relationships between personality and emotions, as well as ideology and emotions, depend on the specific group in question. These results help expand the dual process motivational model of prejudice and suggest the importance of specifying a target group when assessing relationships between personality, ideology, and emotions.

Disabled and Romani passengers face similar levels of discrimination but different levels of open hostility in the sharing economy

This multimethod project investigates discrimination against members of two populous minority groups in the European Union: the Roma (numbering 6 million) and the disabled (numbering 100 million) on a leading Hungarian carpooling platform. In a field experiment, 1005 ride requests were sent to drivers, with passenger group membership (control, disabled, Roma) manipulated between participants. Widespread discrimination against both groups was apparent in significantly lower approval rates for disabled (56%) and Roma passengers (52%) relative to control (70%). Mechanisms driving anti-disabled and anti-Roma discrimination were probed using an experimental manipulation, natural language processing analysis of driver–passenger interactions, and an online survey (N = 398). Individuating information in the form of reviews did not mitigate unequal treatment, thus providing evidence against statistical (stereotype-based) discrimination. Militating against taste-based (attitudinal) discrimination, respondents reported negative attitudes toward Roma passengers but positive attitudes toward disabled passengers. Moreover, despite equivalent approval rates, disabled passengers were more likely to receive a response from drivers and received more polite responses than Roma passengers did. Overall, the observed patterns are most readily explained by intergroup emotions: Contempt toward Roma passengers likely engenders both passive and active harm, whereas pity toward disabled passengers likely engenders passive harm and active facilitation.

From Moderate Action to Radical Protest Intentions

Abstract We examine how anti-Trump democrats ( N = 460), prior to the 2020 election, managed their options to protest, focusing on when moderate collective action predicts more radical intentions to protest. We investigate the relationship of moderate action involvement and effectiveness with radical action intentions and the effects of various other variables such as intergroup emotions, group identification, and political vs. participative efficacy. Although moderate action involvement is correlated with radical intentions, the effectiveness of moderate action is negatively related to radical intentions. Analogously, while political efficacy positively predicts radical action, participative efficacy negatively predicts radical action, both with increasing moderate action experience. Social-identity-based collective action models explain this radical use of political violence as protest (e.g., ESIM) and the counteracting effect of efficacy forms (SIDE, NTL).

Group-based emotion processes generalize across group exemplars and types

We tested three hypotheses derived from intergroup emotions theory: that group-based emotions, emotions felt as a member of a group, (1) are influenced by group norms, (2) especially for highly identified group members, and (3) are relatively more positive for highly identified members. Hypothesis 4 tested the prediction that these self-categorization, normative influence, and identification processes hold across memberships in exemplars of intimacy, task, and social category groups, which differ from one another in structural and functional characteristics. Two studies using three different samples found strong consistent support for Hypotheses 1 and 3, and only partial support for Hypothesis 2 (high identification increased the power of group norms on group-based emotions about only negative events). These findings held across multiple exemplars of the three group types, regardless of whether group-based emotions were targeted or untargeted, and regardless of whether emotion norms were empirically derived or based on group members’ perceptions.

Ground Down and Locked in a Paperweight: Toward a Critical Psychology of Caste-Based Humiliation

AbstractPsychology limits the scope of raising questions important in the caste context. While psychology focuses on why and how people feel humiliated, the question in the caste context is why and how people do not feel humiliated despite incessant and gratuitous attacks on their dignity and self-worth. This article argues that psychology needs to adopt a critical orientation to address the experience of caste-based humiliation. The anticaste perspective of B. R. Ambedkar provides a critical orientation and psychological insights to build a meaningful psychology of caste-based humiliation. Ambedkar rejected individualist, essentialized notions of human self and emphasized the dimension of intergroup emotions to understand caste relations. I develop this argument by analyzing the experience, impact, and resistance to caste-based humiliation among Dalits. I describe caste-based humiliation in extreme (caste atrocities) and less extreme (caste microaggressions) forms and show that the experience of caste-based humiliation is pervasive, direct, but also vicarious. I then examine the psychological impact of caste-based humiliation on the health, social vitality, and appraisal process among Dalits. I show that a caste-ridden context makes it difficult to interpret humiliation and affects Dalit life narratives through retrospective feelings of humiliation. Finally, I consider the issue of resistance to humiliation and show that mere appraisal of humiliation could also be a form of resistance. The article concludes with an emphasis on exploring the scope of psychological resistance to caste-based humiliation through individual and collective acts of meaning that interpret and transform a humiliating existence.

Cultural similarity predicts social inclusion of Muslims in Canada: A vignette-based experimental survey.

Based on acculturation psychology and intergroup emotions theory, the current experimental study assessed the effects of Muslims' perceived acculturation strategies by the majority group on social exclusion of Muslims in Canada, and to what extent religious resentment mediated the relationship between Muslims' perceived acculturation strategies and social exclusion. The experimental study used a vignette-based approach. This model was examined among 190 non-Muslim Canadians. Results showed that when Muslims were viewed as assimilated in Canadian society, social exclusion of Muslims and religious resentment toward Muslims decreased. Furthermore, religious resentment mediated the association between Muslims' perceived acculturation strategies and social exclusion only when Muslims were perceived as assimilated. Our findings suggest that Canadian majority-group members indicated positive attitude toward Muslims when they were identified as assimilated in Canadian society. Results are discussed in terms of implications for future studies and intergroup relations.