Psychology Of Intergroup Conflict Research Articles

Bringing critical social psychology to the study of political polarization

AbstractThe study of political polarization, in both its ideological and its affective expressions, has garnered significantly more interest over the last years. But despite recent research on the conceptualization, measurement, causes, and consequences of this socio‐political phenomenon, and some tentative interventions to mitigate it, relevant new avenues remain surprisingly underdeveloped. Indeed, scholarship in the field of political polarization, mainly in the case of affective polarization, frequently uses cognitivist approaches to make sense of the growing antipathy between different social and political groups. However, the bulk of this work seems to overlook valuable insights into the psychology of intergroup conflict, stereotyping, prejudice reduction, and discourse studies. The aim of this paper is to underline the main gaps in the political polarization literature, to subsequently argue how knowledge linked to the tradition of critical social psychology can help in filling them. Ultimately, the article aims to contribute to the psychosocial study of political polarization and to the design, if necessary, of interventions to counter its detrimental consequences.

Imagine All the People: Negotiating and Mediating Moral Concern through Intergroup Encounters

AbstractIntergroup encounters can often become difficult conversations in which power relations and disagreements are perpetuated and re‐enacted through the interaction and communication between the participating groups. Thus, especially in asymmetric settings, moral inclusion and moral responsibility toward members of other groups are crucial to dialogue, conflict resolution, and reconciliation. Yet it is exactly the circumstances of asymmetry—involving threat and dehumanization—that pose barriers to the elicitation and sustaining of moral concern. Drawing on and integrating two separate research traditions—the psychology of intergroup conflict, dialogue and peace building, and communication research on “mediated suffering”—this article discusses perceptions, representations, and emotions that underlie recognition of and empathy toward the suffering of others with the aim of increasing our understanding of when and how we can be brought—through mediated and unmediated dialogues and encounters—to care about the suffering of others.

The Morality of War: A Review and Research Agenda

What is judged as morally right and wrong in war? I argue that despite many decades of research on moral psychology and the psychology of intergroup conflict, social psychology does not yet have a good answer to this question. However, it is a question of great importance because its answer has implications for decision-making in war, public policy, and international law. I therefore suggest a new way for psychology researchers to study the morality of war that combines the strengths of philosophical just-war theory with experimental techniques and theories developed for the psychological study of morality more generally. This novel approach has already begun to elucidate the moral judgments third-party observers make in war, and I demonstrate that these early findings have important implications for moral psychology, just-war theory, and the understanding of the morality of war.

May God Guide Our Guns

The perceived support of supernatural agents has been historically, ethnographically, and theoretically linked with confidence in engaging in violent intergroup conflict. However, scant experimental investigations of such links have been reported to date, and the extant evidence derives largely from indirect laboratory methods of limited ecological validity. Here, we experimentally tested the hypothesis that perceived supernatural aid would heighten inclinations toward coalitional aggression using a realistic simulated coalitional combat paradigm: competitive team paintball. In a between-subjects design, US paintball players recruited for the study were experimentally primed with thoughts of supernatural support using a guided visualization exercise analogous to prayer, or with a control visualization of a nature scene. The participants then competed in a team paintball battle game modeled after “Capture the Flag.” Immediately before and after the battle, participants completed surveys assessing confidence in their coalitional and personal battle performance. Participants assessed their coalition’s prospects of victory and performance more positively after visualizing supernatural aid. Participants primed with supernatural support also reported inflated assessments of their own performance. Importantly, however, covarying increases in assessments of their overall coalition’s performance accounted for the latter effect. This study provided support for the hypothesis that perceived supernatural support can heighten both prospective confidence in coalitional victory and retrospective confidence in the combat performance of one’s team, while highlighting the role of competitive play in evoking the coalitional psychology of intergroup conflict. These results accord with and extend convergent prior findings derived from laboratory paradigms far removed from the experience of combat. Accordingly, the field study approach utilized here shows promise as a method for investigating coalitional battle dynamics in a realistic, experientially immersive manner.

The psychology of intergroup conflict: A review of theories and measures

We review psychological research on intergroup conflict. First, we outline psychological perspectives on forms and functions of groups. Second, we present the most influential psychological theories of intergroup conflict and describe their similarities and differences in predicting individual prejudice, discrimination, and conflict engagement. Third, we review popular measures of intergroup discrimination, including rating measures, behavioral measures, and allocation tasks. Furthermore, we call for a refined semantic framework to structure and differentiate between different measures of intergroup bias. Fourth, we highlight several interventions that can de-bias intergroup relations and facilitate conflict resolution. Lastly, we propose that research on the psychology of intergroup conflict may benefit from a stronger interdisciplinary orientation regarding both theoretical perspectives and methods used and point out promising avenues for future research.

Reflecting on the Francis report: This has happened before

High levels of stress and perverse rewards in the nursing profession may help explain poor care but to understand the descent into cruelty we need to consider the psychology of intergroup conflict and the role of disgust in generating situations where people can behave in an inhumane manner.

The elementary dynamics of intergroup conflict and revenge

The psychology underlying revenge in an intergroup context is built around a small handful of recurrent interaction types. Analyzing the cost/benefit calculations of each agent’s role within these interaction types provides a more precise way to characterize intergroup conflict and revenge. This in turn allows for more precise models of the psychology of intergroup conflict to be proposed and tested.

Evolution and the psychology of intergroup conflict: the male warrior hypothesis.

The social science literature contains numerous examples of human tribalism and parochialism-the tendency to categorize individuals on the basis of their group membership, and treat ingroup members benevolently and outgroup members malevolently. We hypothesize that this tribal inclination is an adaptive response to the threat of coalitional aggression and intergroup conflict perpetrated by 'warrior males' in both ancestral and modern human environments. Here, we describe how male coalitional aggression could have affected the social psychologies of men and women differently and present preliminary evidence from experimental social psychological studies testing various predictions from the 'male warrior' hypothesis. Finally, we discuss the theoretical implications of our research for studying intergroup relations both in humans and non-humans and discuss some practical implications.

Book Review: The Social Psychology of Intergroup Conflict: Theory, Research, and Applications

Book Review: The Social Psychology of Intergroup Conflict: Theory, Research, and Applications

Review of The Social Psychology of Intergroup Conflict: Theory, Research, and Applications.

Review of The Social Psychology of Intergroup Conflict: Theory, Research, and Applications.

The social psychology of intergroup conflict: Theory, research and applications, edited by W. Stroebe, A.W. Kruglansky, D. Bar-Tal, and M. Hew-stone. New York: Springer-Verlag. 198 pp

The social psychology of intergroup conflict: Theory, research and applications, edited by W. Stroebe, A.W. Kruglansky, D. Bar-Tal, and M. Hew-stone. New York: Springer-Verlag. 198 pp

In Common Predicament: Social Psychology of Intergroup Conflict and Cooperation.

In Common Predicament: Social Psychology of Intergroup Conflict and Cooperation.