Superordinate Group Research Articles

The measurement of (dis-)embedded identification

This article introduces and examines novel measures for generally applicable and insightful forms of collective identification, namely embedded identification and dis-embedded identification, which describe specific constellations of identification with a subordinate ingroup and the respective superordinate (in)group. The measure development process was guided by social identity theory and self-categorization theory, by items employed in previous research, and by empirical research addressing or containing measures of collective identification. In two samples, the young generation in Germany and Muslims in England, the measures showed no problematic characteristics, decent reliability, decent corrected item-total correlations, basic construct validity, as well as metric invariance across both samples. The presented findings hold implications for further research, as the measures provide a reliable and valid option to measure novel forms of collective identification of major interest and relevance for the comprehension of intergroup processes and conflicts in modern and plural societies. Detailed information is provided to enable replication, further use, and further development of the presented measures.

Trauma, bicultural immersion, and growing into self: The impacts of media narratives on former refugees

Background: Building on robust research linking discrimination and poorer mental health outcomes, the current study explores the impacts of macro-level attitudes, such as in media and politics, on refugee wellbeing during resettlement. Method: A purposive sample of six former refugees of Banyamulenge ethnicity from the Democratic Republic of Congo participated in semi-structured interviews. Interviews were transcribed verbatim, analyzed independently by two authors, and then jointly using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Results: Five superordinate group experiential themes emerged from the data, Fleeing, rejection, and illusive safety, straddling two cultures, media stigmatizing identity, different is good, and, g rowth and wellbeing. Themes speak to overcoming turbulence and past trauma, of being othered and rejected along the way to safety that is often elusive. Participants grapple with bicultural identities, and the media’s power in shaping societal narratives. Over time, their history becomes a source of pride for redefining self through strength of character, resilience, and psychological growth. Discussion and conclusion: Findings indicate that for these participants, media was stigmatizing, and negatively impacted wellbeing, confidence, and self-esteem by threatening their self-identity and presenting challenges in other areas of their life, such as work, school, and friendships. Despite this, participants’ experiences of resettlement and bicultural immersion promoted personal growth and a positive outlook for the future. This study recognizes the need to elevate Banyamulenge youth voices as a group poorly represented in research and contributes to a better understanding of how macro-level attitudes in media impact the wellbeing of ethnic minority youth in Australia.

Can Democrats and Republicans like each other? Depends on how you define “American”

Democrats and Republicans increasingly demonstrate negative intergroup attitudes, posing a threat to bipartisan progress. Based on the Common Ingroup Identity Model, people from different political groups can simultaneously identify with a superordinate group, such as a national identity. This has the potential to ameliorate negative intergroup attitudes, though high levels of national identity are also associated with authoritarianism and intolerance. How can a common national identity improve relations between Democrats and Republicans? In this observational study (N = 1,272), Democrats and Republicans differed in how they defined what it means to be American, and higher American identity was related to more positive attitudes toward members of the other party. Most importantly, this relationship was moderated by participants' definition of what it means to be “American,” regardless of party or political orientation. Those who defined what it means to be American in more restrictive terms (i.e., U.S.-born, English-speaking, and Christian) reported less positive attitudes toward members of the other political party as their identification as an American became stronger. Taken together, our results suggest that strengthening national identity might be key to improving attitudes between Democrats and Republicans, as long as this identity is inclusive.

Social Conflict and Social Change in Colson Whitehead’s The Nickel Boys

Social conflict is a common phenomenon in everyday life. Basically, social conflict occurs because of differences in interests between the two groups. As a result, this triggers the emergence of social change in society. Not only in real life but conflict can also be represented in literary works, such as in the novel The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead. The novel tells about the social conflicts that occurr in black and white US society, especially at the Nickel Academy. Furthermore, this study aims to determine the form and impact of social conflict on social change in the novel. This research is included in literary criticism, which uses the sociology of literature approach by applying Ralf Dahrendorf's conflict theory. The data in this study were taken from the novel The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead, which was published in 2019 by Doubleday, US. Research data were analyzed by identifying, classifying, interpreting, and making conclusions. This research resulted in two findings. First, the social conflict in the novel is represented through several acts of discrimination that occur at Nickel Academy. This social conflict occurred as a result of differences in interests and goals between groups in the social structure there, namely the Nickel Academy staff group, which has the above social structure (superordinate group) and the Nickel Academy student group, which has the lower social structure (subordinate group). Second, the social conflict that occurs in the novel has an impact on social change which is related to the social structure that exists in the Nickel Academy. This change is represented by the removal of the social structure that was there by the US government. Moreover, the researcher suggests future researchers use another approach, such as structuralism, psychology, or others. In addition, they can also use other conflict theories, such as the conflict theory of Karl Marx, Lewis A. Coser, or George Simmel.

Instrumental goals shape EU citizens' attitudes to the Russia-Ukraine war over time.

The European Union (EU) legislation suggests that EU member states progressively adopt and implement policies that are primarily in line with the broader European interests, and secondarily with specific national interests. Yet, citizens from various EU member-states often oppose these EU directives and adopt attitudes that favour national interests. The current study investigates whether EU citizens progressively comply with-or digress from-the directives of the superordinate EU group during the Russia-Ukraine war. In a two-wave study we investigated the role of instrumental reasons (i.e., maximisation of material gain) to cooperate with an EU outgroup, namely Russia, in Greeks' (an EU member state) compliance with the EU directives over time during the Russia-Ukraine war. We hypothesised and found that instrumental reasons to cooperate with Russia: (a) encourage EU citizens to support digressing from EU directives and (b) predict decreased identification with the superordinate identity of EU over time. Moreover, since NATO's approach to the Russian invasion closely mirrors that of the EU, we further investigated the effects of instrumental reasons to cooperate with Russia on Greeks' identification with a different superordinate group, namely NATO. Results were largely similar to those we obtained when focusing on EU as a superordinate group.

Structure learning principles of stereotype change.

Why, when, and how do stereotypes change? This paper develops a computational account based on the principles of structure learning: stereotypes are governed by probabilistic beliefs about the assignment of individuals to groups. Two aspects of this account are particularly important. First, groups are flexibly constructed based on the distribution of traits across individuals; groups are not fixed, nor are they assumed to map on to categories we have to provide to the model. This allows the model to explain the phenomena of group discovery and subtyping, whereby deviant individuals are segregated from a group, thus protecting the group's stereotype. Second, groups are hierarchically structured, such that groups can be nested. This allows the model to explain the phenomenon of subgrouping, whereby a collection of deviant individuals is organized into a refinement of the superordinate group. The structure learning account also sheds light on several factors that determine stereotype change, including perceived group variability, individual typicality, cognitive load, and sample size.

Promoting prosocial behavior in an unequal world.

Amid a global pandemic and the climate crisis, there is an increasing need to understand how to promote largescale, coordinated action between different groups. Yet certain factors such as inequality can hinder cooperation. We aimed to establish how to orient groups toward a superordinate goal when they have unequal resources. Participants were divided into two 'countries' and asked to assemble LEGO bricks into food (by building pieces in a certain order) to prevent starvation among 'the people'. One 'country' had few LEGO bricks whereas the other had an abundance, and the only way to maximize food creation was for the groups to work together. We assessed the efficacy of three diverse interventions on superordinate behavior and attitudes: compassion meditation training (Study 1), lower inequality (Study 2), and the introduction of a pro-sharing group norm by a confederate (Study 3). Compassion meditation training and altering the degree of inequality between groups did not have a clear effect on collaborative action. Only the introduction of a pro-sharing group norm enhanced sharing behavior, made participants feel more cooperative and reduced fears of being compassionate toward others. Our findings speak to the importance of leadership in promoting coordinated action to address challenges that face the superordinate group.

Further evidence that system justification amongst the disadvantaged is positively related to superordinate group identification

Members of disadvantaged groups sometimes support societal systems that enable the very inequalities that disadvantaged them. Is it possible to explain this puzzling system-justifying orientation in terms of rational group-interested motives, without recourse to a separate system motive? The social identity model of system attitudes (SIMSA) claims that it is. SIMSA proposes that the system justification shown by a disadvantaged group (e.g., African American women) can sometimes support identity needs that are tied to a more inclusive (superordinate) in-group (e.g., Americans). There is already some supportive evidence for this proposition, but it is not yet clear whether: (1) such trends are visible in a wider range of disadvantaged contexts, and (2) this explanation also applies to those who are strongly invested in their subgroup (e.g., feminists). In two waves of a large nationally representative survey from 21 to 23 European states (Ntotal = 84,572) and two controlled experiments (Ntotal = 290 women), we found that: (a) system justification was positively associated with superordinate ingroup identification across multiple cases of disadvantage (Studies 1–3), (b) system justification increased when this inclusive identity was made more salient (Studies 2 & 3), and (c) system justification was visible even amongst feminists when they activated their superordinate (Italian) identity (Study 3).

The gendered nature of Muslim and Christian stereotypes in the United States.

Despite the increasing diversity of religious affiliations in the United States, little research has explored the nature and structure of religious stereotypes of Muslims in America. The present research explores the gendered dimensions of stereotypes of both Muslims and Christians, using a multimethod approach. In Study 1, participants engaged in visual representations of intersectional and superordinate identities using Venn diagrams and slider tasks. Study 2 elicited open trait listings for religious, gender, and intersectional groups, with the most common traits reported for each group. In a conceptual replication, Study 3 asked participants to rate each group for the applicability of the most common traits identified in Study 2. Across the three studies, we found clear and consistent support for intersectionality effects. Unique stereotypic traits were identified for each intersectional group that were not present in either religious or gender superordinate identity. Stereotypes of Christians as a superordinate group contained a balanced representation of Christian men and Christian women traits. In contrast, Muslim stereotypes were strongly influenced by androcentric assumptions, with approximately 80% of the traits ascribed to Muslims overlapping with those of Muslim men. In addition, Muslim women were rated as significantly different from both Muslims and Muslim men on all trait evaluations. This was not observed with Christians, who showed little differentiation by gender. This research provides a rare systematic analysis of the gendered nature of religious stereotypes of Christians and Muslims and contributes to the developing literature on intersectionality and prototypicality.

Intergroup Leadership: The Challenge of Successfully Leading Fractured Groups and Societies

Leadership often involves providing leadership to a group that is structured into separate subgroups that have distinctive self-contained identities that are cherished by their members. In this respect, leadership can be characterized as intergroup leadership. The challenge of intergroup leadership is to forge a superordinate identity that does not erase or blur the subgroups’ identity boundaries and create a threat to the subgroups’ social identity distinctiveness, as such identity threat can provoke intersubgroup conflict that fragments the superordinate group. According to intergroup-leadership theory, successful intergroup leaders need to construct, promote, and exemplify an intergroup relational identity that preserves subgroups’ distinctiveness and celebrates that distinctiveness and intersubgroup cooperation as fundamental aspects of subgroup and superordinate-group identity. In this article, we describe intergroup-leadership theory (which applies to groups of all sizes and complexions), summarize empirical support for its main tenets, and outline extensions and future directions.

From Claiming to Creating Value: The Psychology of Negotiations on Common Resource Dilemmas

Current sustainability challenges often reflect common resource dilemmas where peoples’ short-term self-interests are at odds with collective interests in the present and future. In this article, we highlight the key role of joint decision-making processes in negotiations to facilitate the management of common resource dilemmas and to promote the transition toward sustainability. By reflecting on psychological drivers and barriers, we argue that the limited availability, the restricted accessibility, and the dynamic alterability of resources in negotiations on common resource dilemmas may cause a myopic mindset that fosters value claiming strategies and, ultimately, results in distributive-consumptive negotiation outcomes. To promote value creation in negotiations on common resource dilemmas, we argue that agents must perform a mindset shift with an inclusive social identity on a superordinate group level, an embracive prosocial motivation for other parties’ interests at and beyond the table, and a forward-looking cognitive orientation towards long-term consequences of their joint decisions. By shifting their mindset from a myopic towards a holistic cognitive orientation, agents may explore negotiation strategies to create value through increasing the availability, improving the accessibility, and using the alterability of resources. Applying these value creation strategies may help achieve integrative-transformative negotiation outcomes and promote sustainable agreements aimed at intersectional, interlocal, and intergenerational justice. We conclude by discussing additional psychological factors that play a pivotal role in negotiations on common resource dilemmas as well as further developments for future research.

Computational Modeling of Stereotype Content in Text.

Stereotypes are encountered every day, in interpersonal communication as well as in entertainment, news stories, and on social media. In this study, we present a computational method to mine large, naturally occurring datasets of text for sentences that express perceptions of a social group of interest, and then map these sentences to the two-dimensional plane of perceived warmth and competence for comparison and interpretation. This framework is grounded in established social psychological theory, and validated against both expert annotation and crowd-sourced stereotype data. Additionally, we present two case studies of how the model might be used to answer questions using data “in-the-wild,” by collecting Twitter data about women and older adults. Using the data about women, we are able to observe how sub-categories of women (e.g., Black women and white women) are described similarly and differently from each other, and from the superordinate group of women in general. Using the data about older adults, we show evidence that the terms people use to label a group (e.g., old people vs. senior citizens) are associated with different stereotype content. We propose that this model can be used by other researchers to explore questions of how stereotypes are expressed in various large text corpora.

Better Attitudes toward Foreigners: Effects of Dual-Identity, Identity Fusion with the Country and Humanity

Social categorization implies a difference between “we” and “they”, motivating people to create or maintain a positive group distinctiveness, which leads to intergroup bias. The common ingroup identity model proposes that recategorization from separated subgroups into an inclusive superordinate group can reduce intergroup bias. However, further research shows that bias reduction is more likely when a dual identity is created, wherein the ingroup and superordinate identities are simultaneously salient and, thus, ingroup distinctiveness is safeguarded within this recategorization process. The present study examined the effect of dual versus common identity representations on attitudes toward foreigners, as well as the dependence of this effect on identity fusion with the country and all humanity. Participants (n = 149) were assigned to one of two conditions: Worldwide (common) Identity, and Dual-Identity. Regression analysis indicated that, relative to the worldwide identity condition, the dual-identity condition produced more positive attitudes toward foreigners: less willingness to fight, greater perceived common identity, and stronger trust. This last result was moderated by identity fusion with the country and all humanity. Findings suggest that to reduce intergroup bias, it is important that people perceive themselves as members of all humanity without having to relinquish their ingroup identity

Identity, legitimacy and cooperation with police: Comparing general-population and street-population samples from London.

Social identity is a core aspect of procedural justice theory, which predicts that fair treatment at the hands of power holders such as police expresses, communicates, and generates feelings of inclusion, status, and belonging within salient social categories. In turn, a sense of shared group membership with power holders, with police officers as powerful symbolic representatives of “law-abiding society,” engenders trust, legitimacy, and cooperation. Yet, this aspect of the theory is rarely explicitly considered in empirical research. Moreover, the theory rests on the underexamined assumption that the police represent one fixed and stable superordinate group, including the often-marginalized people with whom they interact, and that it is only superordinate identification that is important to legitimacy and cooperation. In this article, we present results from two U.K.-based studies that explore the identity dynamics of procedural justice theory. We reason that the police not only represent the “law-abiding, national citizen” superordinate group but also are a symbol of order/conflict and a range of connected social categories that can generate relational identification. First, we used a general-population sample and found that relational identification with police and identification as a law-abiding citizen mediated some of the association between procedural justice and legitimacy and were both stronger predictors of cooperation than legitimacy. Second, a sample of people living on the streets of London was used to explore these same relationships among a highly marginalized group for whom the police might represent a salient outgroup. We found that relational and superordinate identification were both strong positive predictors of cooperation, whereas legitimacy was not. These results have important implications for our understanding of both police legitimacy and public cooperation, as well as the extent to which police activity can serve to include—or exclude—members of the public. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved)

Ingroup Projection in American Politics: An Obstacle to Bipartisanship

One potential obstacle to cooperation between political parties is ingroup projection, the tendency for members of subgroups to define superordinate groups based on characteristics of their own ingroups. In five studies spanning 11 years and three presidential administrations, we demonstrated that ingroup projection can be an obstacle that prevents bipartisanship between Republicans and Democrats. Study 1 showed that Americans perceived political ingroups as more prototypical of Americans than outgroups and that the degree of mismatch between the outgroup and the superordinate group was associated with ingroup bias. Studies 2–5 demonstrated that perceiving the outgroup as poorly fitting the prototype of the superordinate group predicted opposition to bipartisan cooperation and a lower likelihood of having engaged in bipartisan behavior (Studies 4 and 5). These studies provide evidence for ingroup projection among American political parties and suggest that it contributes to political polarization.

Preserving prosociality in the face of inequality: A role for multiple group memberships and superordinate group identification

Economic inequality has been linked to profound negative impacts due to its corrosive effect on social relations, and fairness is central to this. In line with social cure theorising, we propose that identification with (superordinate) groups can buffer against these effects. Study 1 ( N = 400) found that perceived fairness of inequality was negatively associated with helping attitudes, but this was attenuated among those who identified more strongly with a superordinate group. Study 2 ( N = 315) focused on perceived fairness of inequality and an expanded range of prosocial outcomes. Perceptions that inequality was fairer were associated with worse prosocial outcomes. However, these relationships were attenuated among those who reported belonging to more groups and those who identified strongly with the superordinate group. These studies highlight the role that group memberships and superordinate identification may play in countering the corrosive effects of societal inequality on prosocial behaviour.

The onset of COVID-19, common identity, and intergroup prejudice

ABSTRACT The research presented here examined the relationship between the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, social group identity, intergroup contact, and prejudice. Utilizing a common ingroup identity approach, two datasets, which were composed of data from university students collected via online questionnaires before and after the onset of COVID-19, were combined (N = 511). Participants identified as either one of two subordinate student identities: domestic (i.e. U.S. citizen or permanent resident) or international (i.e. non-U.S. citizen or foreign resident), then reported on the strength of their subordinate and superordinate identity (university identity). Participants also reported on their contact experiences with outgroup members, outgroup stereotypes, and completed a novel intergroup bias task. Results indicated that after the onset of the pandemic, participants more strongly identified with the superordinate group, which predicted greater perceived intergroup contact and lower intergroup bias. Theoretical implications and future directions are discussed.

If they don't care, I won't share: Feeling unrelated to one's in‐group increases selfishness instead of behavior for the greater good

AbstractIndividuals cooperate more with others to whom they feel connected. As a consequence, reduced belonging to an in‐group decreases cooperation with this group, but not with others. Sometimes, however, there may be no new group available to (re)affiliate with. In this case, reduced belonging may either increase cooperation on a higher level, such as with the superordinate group humanity, or increase selfishness. We investigate this in an online experiment and a survey study. Study 1 (N = 299) showed that being ostracized in Cyberball reduced cooperation with the ostracizers and increased selfish behavior, while cooperation with humanity did not increase. Similarly, Study 2 (N = 1300) showed that lower feelings of belonging were associated with more selfishness, as fewer participants decided to donate to a humanitarian cause. These findings highlight the importance of inclusion and integration for societies and communities who wish to maintain a high level of cooperation.

The Effects of Multi-Level Group Identification on Intergroup Helping Behavior

ABSTRACT We conduct an experiment to examine the effects of multi-level group identification on intergroup helping behavior. We predict and find that stronger identification with a sub-group and a superordinate group—separately and interactively—increase helping behavior. We provide evidence that the relationships between stronger identification and helping behavior operate in part through increased salience of superordinate group boundaries, perceived potential benefits to one's own group of intergroup helping, and positive affect. Collectively, our findings illustrate the importance of understanding how individuals identify with the different groups naturally present in organizations and highlight how identification can be used as an informal control to motivate important organizational behaviors. Such an understanding can help firms determine the best organizational hierarchy, develop communication and control strategies to build identification at appropriate levels, and establish evaluation and compensation systems that measure and reward outcomes in a manner that accounts for these group effects.

Battling ingroup bias with effective intergroup leadership.

Intergroup conflict and bias often occur between subgroups nested within a superordinate group. In these situations, the leader of the superordinate group plays a key role, as an intergroup leader, in reducing conflict. To be effective, an intergroup leader should avoid (1) threatening the subgroups' distinctive identities, and (2) being viewed by one or both groups as ‘one of them’ rather than ‘one of us’. Intergroup leadership theory (Acad Manag Rev, 37, 2012a, 232) posits intergroup leaders can improve subgroup relations by promoting an intergroup relational identity. Two studies (Ns = 178 and 223) tested whether an out‐subgroup or in‐subgroup leader could improve intergroup attitudes, even among strong subgroup identifiers, by promoting either an intergroup relational identity or a collective identity. We hypothesized an interaction of these variables demonstrating the effectiveness of an intergroup relational identity message for an out‐subgroup leader in lessening ingroup bias, especially among strong subgroup identification. Our results, and a meta‐analytic summary across both studies (N = 401), supported our hypothesis and intergroup leadership theory, demonstrating an intergroup relational identity is an effective strategy for improving intergroup relations.