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The article discusses value of cross-cultural research in social psychology. The author states that he agrees with many points presented by researcher Claude Faucheux's, in his paper titled "Cross-Cultural Research in Social Psychology." The author however has an epistemological disagreement with Faucheux. It is addressed to the central theme of Faucheux's paper, which is the question regarding what constitutes a valid scientific approach to social sciences and more particularly to social psychology.

The article discusses the "Minimal Group Paradigm" which is defined solely in terms of the independent variable, social categorization per se. It is not defined by dependent variables or response techniques and strategies. For example, the paradigm cannot be considered in advance as being a "conflict situation." It was initially, and it remains, a minimal categorization situation." To introduce "conflict" in the initial definition is to put the cart before the horse and to confuse results with independent variables: "conflict" is hardly "minimal".

The introduction to the EJSP special issue brings together recent literature on allyship. We present and discuss different definitions of allyship and highlight a multiple perspectives approach to understanding the predictors and consequences of allyship. This approach suggests that engagement in allyship can be driven by egalitarian and non‐egalitarian motivations and that the behaviours identified as allyship can have different meanings, causes and consequences depending on whether researchers take into account the allies' perspective or the disadvantaged groups' perspective. We use this approach as an organizing principle to identify themes that emerge in the papers included in this special issue. We start with four papers that consider the perspective of the advantaged group, followed by two papers that consider the perspective of the disadvantaged group. Finally, we introduce two theoretical papers that examine the relations between disadvantaged groups and allies, and we set out directions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents comments of the author on the article "Cross-Cultural Research in Experimental Social Psychology," by researcher Faucheux Claude. He discusses cross-cultural psychology as a social science and states that every human being perceives, imagines, fears, learns, evaluates, communicates, responds and strives. The scientific study of these phenomena and the attempt to explain them is the domain of psychology, which employs for that purpose distal and proximal antecedent variables and mediating processes. The culture is actually embedded in each of the other distal antecedents. This confirms that the human being and his environment constitute an interacting system and makes it impossible to isolate cross-cultural and social psychology from related disciplines.

This paper investigates the role of political ideology with regard to changes in beliefs on political and non‐political issues. In line with the political asymmetry hypothesis and threat sensitivity accounts in relation to ideology, it was assumed that right‐wing adherents would change their prior beliefs (on political and non‐political issues) to a lesser extent in response to counterevidence than left‐wing adherents. We also expected that the mechanism responsible for this effect would be accounted for by individual differences in threat sensitivity. To test these hypotheses, we conducted two experimental studies (total N = 576) in which participants holding right‐ and left‐wing views were exposed to new information, inconsistent with their prior beliefs, on political and non‐political issues. Contrary to expectations, we found that individuals with right‐ and left‐wing beliefs did not differ in the degree of change to their prior beliefs in response to counterevidence. Nor did we find evidence indicating that threat sensitivity was responsible for the link between ideology and belief change. The paper's findings contribute to the ongoing discussion around ideological (a)symmetry and the controversies concerning threat‐related ideological differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the exponential increase in the number of refugees and displaced people worldwide, it has become critical to examine the experiences of refugees; particularly their identity, since it is an important marker of their adjustment to the new context. Besides other factors impacting their identity and adjustment, the role of the leader is important as it can impact the construction of refugee identities. This paper explores the construction and negotiation of Tibetan refugee identities through the identity entrepreneurship of the Dalai Lama, the spiritual and erstwhile political leader of the Tibetans. It is postulated that leaders are entrepreneurs of identity who shape identity construction and negotiation. With an emphasis on the social, political, and historical context, three kinds of sources are analysed using a discourse‐historical approach to understand how leaders function as entrepreneurs of identity across the various contexts and negotiate identity construction across the shifting contexts. First, 12 speeches by the Dalai Lama on 10 critical events in Tibetan history since 1959; second, six speeches by the Dalai Lama for Tibetan Uprising Day (1961–2009); and third, two international interviews (CNN, 2009; BBC, 2012). The analysis demonstrates that the identity entrepreneurship of the Dalai Lama has strong elements of protection towards the ingroup, that is, the Tibetan refugees, through the crafting of a collective sense of identity for Tibetans. The study sheds new light on the nature of refugee leadership, acknowledging the impact of the shifting nature of identity, from a native citizen to refugee; and the leader's identity entrepreneurship in these evolving and often malleable contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social image, or the views that others have of us and our groups, plays a role in a wide array of psychological processes, including impression management, interpersonal relationships, mate selection, intragroup and intergroup processes, the experience and expression of emotion, gender differences in behavior, and the construction and maintenance of social status. The 13 papers included in this special issue reflect the centrality of social image in these and other social-psychological processes. Five major themes integrate this diverse selection of papers: (i) self-presentation of social image; (ii) culture-specific conceptions of social image; (iii) the role of social image in emotion; (iv) respect and status as reflections of social image; and (v) the influence of social image on ingroup and outgroup perceptions. Taken together, these papers illustrate the importance of social image for understanding the complexities of human behavior and point to new ways to study this important topic. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the increasing wage disparities and the unfair distribution of resources in many organizations, there have not been enough academic explorations into the role of these contextual variables on dehumanization processes and psychosocial risk factors among employees. This project addresses how perceptions of economic inequality and unfairness in the distribution of resources can influence individuals' perceptions of dehumanization and self‐objectification, and trigger detrimental consequences in the workplace. Using two correlational surveys in different cultural contexts (N = 748), and two experimental studies (N = 662), this research consistently shows that both high inequality and high unfairness perceptions decrease job satisfaction and dignity at work through dehumanization processes. Specifically, both inequality and unfairness increase perceived organizational dehumanization, which in turn increases participants' self‐objectification. Self‐objectification is associated with lower job satisfaction and dignity at work. This paper discusses the consequences of economic disparities on individuals' recognition of their own humanity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we explore whether mental representations about birth (birth‐related mindsets) assessed during pregnancy can predict labour and birth in the sense that the perception of birth as a natural (rather than a medical) event increases the probability of a low‐intervention birth. Birth, in turn, might affect short‐term and long‐term psychological well‐being. These assumptions were tested in a longitudinal study (N = 311), spanning the first half of pregnancy and up to 6 months after birth. The results of a single indicator model displayed a sequential process: women who held a more natural mindset prenatally were more likely to have low‐intervention births, which resulted in a more positive evaluation of the birth experience, which in turn predicted well‐being in the first weeks after birth (measured with ecological momentary assessment), and subsequently postpartum depression and post‐traumatic stress symptoms 8 weeks after birth as well as mother‐infant bonding 6 months after birth. The study demonstrates the relevance of psychological factors for childbirth. The construct of a birth‐related mindset could contribute to a better understanding of childbirth and help to make women's birth experiences safer and more satisfying and to improve the transition to motherhood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author reflects on their process of handling articles for the journal's special section "Registered Reports" (RR), particularly on their focus on the originality of the research and the soundness of the used methods.

This paper examines social‐psychological factors that can facilitate and hinder public support for conservative agendas over time. Using four waves of longitudinal panel data from Chile (N = 2,394), we estimated the between‐person and within‐person associations among individuals' self‐reported conservative ideologies, political disaffection, civic behaviour, political attitudes towards democracy and social change, and their support for conservative (vs progressive) social movements over time. As expected, between‐person increases in social dominance orientation (SDO), right‐wing authoritarianism (RWA), right‐wing self‐categorization, and political disaffection correlated positively with support for conservative social movements. Between‐person increases in people's social change beliefs, support for democracy, and civic participation predicted less support for conservative social movements over time. Within‐person increases in RWA and SDO correlated positively with conservative social movement support, whereas civic participation correlated negatively with it. Results provide novel evidence for the dynamic processes underlying support for conservative/progressive agendas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, social psychology has become central in the study of morality. This turn to morality as a topic builds on social psychologists' long-standing interest in issues closely related to morality, such as cooperation, empathy, fairness, social norms and deviance. The present paper introduces a (virtual) special issue on morality by highlighting some of the 41 articles on 'moral' or 'morality' that have appeared in the European Journal of Social Psychology from 1973 to the present. The nineteen highlighted papers are organized into the main topics covered in research on morality published in EJSP: Emotion, Impression Formation and Trait Inference, Norms and Deviance, Stereotypes, and Reasoning and Judgment. A description of the historical trends that characterized research on morality in EJSP is also provided. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the predicted replicability of experimental research on system justification theory (SJT) by conducting a z‐curve analysis. Z‐curve is a meta‐analytic technique similar to p‐curve, but which performs better under conditions of heterogeneity. It estimates the predicted replication rate, average power, false discovery risk, and file drawer ratio (FDR) of a sample of studies. The z‐curve based on 116 papers and 232 unique samples suggests that the experimental SJT literature is likely to show low rates of replicability, as indicated by an overall average statistical power of 16%. Moderator analyses suggest that this may be driven in part by publication pressures, that the replicability of research in this area has improved since 2015, and that studies using system threat manipulations show particularly low estimated replication rates (ERR). Implications for the replicability and validity of the experimental SJT literature are discussed, and recommendations to increase the rigor of research are put forth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper tests the effects of lay beliefs that disaster victims who have been victimised by other events in the past will cope better with a new adverse event than first‐time victims. It is shown that believing that disaster victims can get habituated to suffering reduces helping intentions towards victims of repeated adversity, because repeatedly victimised victims are perceived to be less traumatised by a new adverse event. In other words, those who buy into habituation beliefs will impute less trauma and suffering to repeated victims compared to first‐time victims, and they will therefore feel less inclined to help those repeatedly victimised victims. This was demonstrated in a series of six studies, two of which were preregistered (total N = 1010). Studies 1, 2, and 3 showed that beliefs that disaster victims become habituated to pain do indeed exist among lay people. Such beliefs are factually inaccurate, because repeated exposure to severe adversity makes it harder, not easier, for disaster victims to cope with a new negative event. Therefore, we call this belief the 'habituation fallacy'. Studies 2, 3, and 4 demonstrated an indirect negative effect of a belief in the 'habituation fallacy' on 'helping intentions', via lesser 'trauma' ascribed to victims who had previously been victimised. Studies 5 and 6 demonstrated that a belief in the 'habituation fallacy' causally affects trauma ascribed to, and helping intentions towards, repeatedly victimised victims, but not first‐time victims. The habituation fallacy can potentially explain reluctance to donate to humanitarian causes in those geographical areas that frequently fall prey to disasters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past decades, LGBTQ+ issues have been at the centre of politics, social movements, and human rights discussions across the world. Consistent with these developments, there is a growing interest in social psychological research into sexual orientation and gender identities. The emerging research not only taps recent societal developments and the effects of these on LGBTQ+ people; but also focuses on very old research questions of stereotypes and prejudice that are still relevant today. In this special issue, we bring together nine papers addressing several of these issues using qualitative, correlational, and experimental methods with sexual majority and minority samples across different cultural contexts. We discuss the current state of the field and how further research could enhance our understanding of LGBTQ+ issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the current state of the field in social psychology. On the one hand, we have made enormous progress in integrating our research with other disciplines, reaching out to general public and using our knowledge toward addressing major societal ills. On the other hand, social psychology has been recently mired in a crisis of confidence concerning the appropriateness of our methods and the robustness of our findings. We propose that shifting our attention to theory, method, and application, as well as away from a pervasive 'outcome focus,' can extricate social psychology from its current doldrums and allow it to realize its potential as an indispensable social science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to provide a picture of the present European research topics in Social Psychology, using the 339 papers presented at the 1993 General Meeting of the EAESP. The most frequent themes of research are analysed and the structure of the association of those themes are described in a two-factor structure. The first factor differentiates research in terms of level of analysis and the second factor contrasts types of applied research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At a meeting on social psychology in Bielefeld, Germany, 60 members of 15 different countries presented 26 scientific papers. Here in Weimar, Germany, more than 85 members have presented or will present about 70 papers. For those who do not put much faith in numbers one may perhaps recall the issues which were before them at the time of the Bielefeld conference. The previous president of the Association, Claude Flament, pointed out that this committee has first of all considered our contacts with socialist countries and to a lesser extent with mediterranean countries.

The process of globalisation has gained tremendous momentum over recent decades, resulting in unprecedented human interconnectedness and awareness of global concerns. The current special issue of the European Journal of Social Psychology brings together 10 papers that address this development. This special issue showcases different perspectives on the psychological processes that underlie the cognitive and behavioural responses to the global challenges humankind has created and is now facing. In introducing these contributions, we identified three emerging topics for social psychological theorising and application vis-à-vis globalisation and global concerns: (i) supranational identification and attachment, (ii) political and ideological responses to globalisation and global concerns, and (iii) global protest and change. We integrate these topics by highlighting some future prospects of this emerging field of research and its significance for understanding social change in these tumultuous times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article comments on the paper of sociologist Serge Moscovici on social psychology. Moscovici believes that social psychology was once becoming an influential crossroads discipline, one that could shape and nurture other social sciences such as economics, anthropology and sociology. Moscovici's solution to the problem of how to become a powerful discipline seems to be along the lines of getting back to basics. Throughout his paper, Moscovici urges other social psychologists to consider the importance of creating rich descriptions garnered through careful, painstaking observations. In various ways an inductivist model of science within a positivist-empiricist framework informs Moscovici's views of the ideal social psychology. Moscovici seems to believe that the positivist-empiricist mode of scientific method is unchallenged within social psychology and sciences more generally. The author stresses the similarities between Moscovici's philosophy of science and that of the most traditional mainstream laboratory social psychologist.

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This Agenda article first considers whether social psychology is in the best or worst of times and suggests that we are instead in extraordinary times, given exciting agendas and potential policy relevance, if we are careful. The article illustrates with two current research agendas-the hybrid vigor of multiple categories and the psychology of social class-that could inform policy. The essay then reflects on how we know when our work is indeed ready for the public arena. Regarding hybrids: world immigration, social media, and global businesses are increasing. How will this complicate people's stereotypes of each other? One agenda could build on the existing social and behavioral science of people as social hybrids, emerging with a framework to synthesize existing work and guide future research that better reflects our changing world. Policy implications already emerge from our current knowledge of hybrids. Regarding the social psychology of social class: We do not know enough yet to give advice, except to suggest questioning some common stereotypes, for example, about the economic behavior of lower-income people. Before the budding social psychology of class can be ready for policy export, the research results need replication, validation, and generality. Overall, principles of exportable policy insights include peer-reviewed standards, honest brokering, nonpartisan advice, and respectful, trustworthy communication. Social psychology can take advantage of its extraordinary times to be innovative and useful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research suggests that inducing fixed (rather than malleable) beliefs about groups leads to more negative attitudes toward out-groups. The present paper identifies the underlying mechanism of this effect. We show that individuals with a fixed belief about groups tend to construe intergroup settings as threatening situations that might reveal shortcomings of their in-group (perceived threat). In the present research, we measured (Study 1) and manipulated (Study 2) participants' lay theories about group malleability. We found that the extent to which individuals had an entity (versus an incremental) group theory influenced the level of threat they felt when interacting with out-group members, and that perceived threat in turn affected their level of ethnocentrism and prejudice. These findings shed new light on the role of lay theories in intergroup attitudes and suggest new ways to reduce prejudice. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are two aims to this paper; to report in brief preliminary form a number of studies on group risk-taking that have been carried out in Bristol in the past two years, and to relate these studies to an explanation of group risk-taking phenomena primarily in terms of group polarization. The paper has five sections. The first section supplies some background material regarding basic phenomena and previous attempts at explanations. The second section relates to initial individual decisions and the third section to decisions following group discussion and consensus. In the fourth section a tentative explanation of group risk-taking effects is proposed in terms of group polarization processes, together with something like an overall value for risk. Group polarization itself is discussed in terms of normative and informational aspects of social influence. The final section deals with two implications of the proposed explanation, one relating to the role of individual familiarization and the other to the generality of group polarization processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The construction of national identities through political discourse is a growing field of interest to social psychologists, particularly as many countries face changing demographics, borders and social realities as part of globalization, immigration and continued political integration and conflict. Through an analysis of 17 key speeches by Serbian politicians over the past 25 years, the present paper explores the question of how politicians, as entrepreneurs of identity, discursively manage the relationship between identity continuity and political change over time, in attempts to construct the future of a nation. We particularly explore this issue in the context of Serbia's present political aspirations toward joining the European Union. The findings indicate that (i) political change becomes negotiated within the framework of established and legitimized identity discourses that have developed over time, and (ii) while history is frequently drawn on to support political agendas, it is successful to the extent that this history offers a sense of cultural continuity rather than a coherent narrative of historical events and time periods. We conclude by arguing for the benefits that a diachronic approach to political discourse can offer social psychologists interested in the discursive construction of national identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: In recent years, psychologists have started to investigate the downstream consequences of nonconsciously activated behaviour (acting in an ‘explanatory vacuum’). Results have shown that when such behaviour is norm‐violating, people experience a need to confabulate reasons for this behaviour. The present paper aims to add more convincing evidence for this assumption. Study 1 addresses this question by replicating Study 2 of Adriaanse, Weijers, De Ridder, De Witt Huberts, and Evers ( ) while adding a condition in which people are post hoc provided with an explanation for their behaviour. Study 2 addresses this question by explicitly demanding an explanation for a nonconsciously steered choice. Both studies were conducted in the context of eating behaviour. Results of both studies were indicative of confabulation as a downstream consequence of nonconsciously steered eating behaviour (Study 1) or food choice (Study 2). Future research should address the potential of confabulated reasons spilling over to next occasions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper adopts a social identity perspective to examine the relationship between community-based identification and well-being, resilience and willingness to pay back in the context of urban regeneration. A sample of 104 residents across five deprived urban areas in the southwest of England that have recently undergone or are about to undergo regeneration projects completed a survey. The results demonstrate that areas where a more community-centred, bottom-up, approach to regeneration was taken (i.e., 'culture-led') showed higher levels of community cohesion than areas where the community dynamics were ignored (i.e., a 'top-down' approach to regeneration). Increased community identification was linked to greater perceived social support, community-esteem, personal self-esteem and self-efficacy. These psychological processes were, in turn, linked to increased resilience and well-being, as well as a stronger willingness to pay back to the community. The results are consistent with the social identity approach. Implications for urban regeneration strategies are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Judgments and decisions are frequently biased by attribute framing, presenting either positive or negative attributes of an object. This paper focused on two factors previously shown to moderate the attribute-framing bias: mode of presentation and participants' numeric ability. Whereas many studies demonstrated that graphical display reduced the bias, recent findings suggest that graphical manipulation can nevertheless elicit significant framing bias. Numeracy has been shown to moderate attribute-framing bias when the quantitative information was represented by numbers. The present study examined to what extent numeracy would still moderate the framing bias when it is graphically elicited. The results showed a significant framing bias for graphically as well as for numerically represented framing scenarios. Critically, whereas numeracy moderated the framing bias in numerically represented scenarios, it did not have a similar moderating effect when the quantitative information in the scenario was graphically represented. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adding to the growing literature on the antecedents of conspiracy beliefs, this paper argues that a small part in motivating the endorsement of such seemingly irrational beliefs is the desire to stick out from the crowd, the need for uniqueness. Across three studies, we establish a modest but robust association between the self-attributed need for uniqueness and a general conspirational mindset (conspiracy mentality) as well as the endorsement of specific conspiracy beliefs. Following up on previous findings that people high in need for uniqueness resist majority and yield to minority influence, Study 3 experimentally shows that a fictitious conspiracy theory received more support by people high in conspiracy mentality when this theory was said to be supported by only a minority (vs. majority) of survey respondents. Together, these findings support the notion that conspiracy beliefs can be adopted as a means to attain a sense of uniqueness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prejudice and stereotyping are central to research and theorizing in social psychology. Yet, all too often this work tacitly assumes that these phenomena spring into existence fully formed in adults. This special issue originates from the need to integrate adult social psychological approaches with developmental inquiry into the ontogenetic and phylogenetic origins of prejudice and stereotyping. The diverse set of nine papers in this special issue demonstrates the utility of this interdisciplinary approach. In this introduction, we make the case for giving developmental research a seat at the social psychological table, and briefly summarize the contributions contained in this special issue. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Relative ingroup prototypicality (RIP) is an important concept in the ingroup projection model (IPM) of social discrimination and tolerance. This paper reviews measures of RIP currently in use and critically examines how the notion of RIP is captured by statistical tests treating RIP as a single variable. It is concluded that composite measures of RIP imply multiple statistical hypotheses that have previously been confounded. The value of an alternative multiple regression approach is illustrated in a study testing the hypothesis of a negative relationship between RIP and outgroup attitudes. Results based on the conventional univariate analyses would have confirmed or disconfirmed the hypothesis depending on the scoring method. In contrast, the multiple regression approach described in this paper resolves this ambiguity by suggesting that only outgroup prototypicality may be necessary to predict outgroup attitudes. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates whether several aspects of social comparison in school classes differ as a function of the type of relation between the student and his or her target. Participants were 9612 students in the first grade of secondary education in the Netherlands (equivalent to Grade 7 in the US). Results indicated that (1) 78% of the students who had at least one friend also compared with a friend; (2) social comparison with friends was much more often reciprocal than comparison with non-friends; (3) preferences for upward and downward comparison were less often given by students who compared with friends than students who compared with non-friends; (4) the similarity in initial performance level between students and their comparison targets was higher when targets were friends; (5) despite these differences, which seem to imply that friends often serve as routine standards whereas non-friends are more deliberately chosen as comparison targets, it appeared that consequences of social comparison for subsequent performance were about the same for both types of relations. Further findings of this paper suggest that previously found effects of friends' grades on subsequent performance may be explained by social comparison. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Power is an inescapable feature of human social life and structure. This paper addresses the nature of power. The standard theory is that power is the capacity for influence and that influence is based on the control of resources valued or desired by others. However, there have always been problems with this theory and new ones have appeared. The paper summarizes the standard theory and its problems, outlines the different meanings of power and presents a new theory emphasizing group identity, social organization and ideology rather than dependence as the basis of power. It proposes that power is based on persuasion, authority and coercion. A key point is that the theory changes the way these processes have been understood by reversing the causal sequence of the standard theory. The latter argues that control of resources produces power, power is the basis of influence and that mutual influence leads to the formation of a psychological group. The three-process theory argues that psychological group formation produces influence, that influence is the basis of power and that power leads to the control of resources. Implications of the theory for social change, coercion, prejudice and the extent to which power is a social evil are briefly noted. The challenge is to study how power emerges from and functions within social relationships with a definite social, ideological and historical content rather than reifying it as an abstract external force producing generic psychological effects. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we investigated the interplay of self-interest and equity concerns in coalition formation by manipulating the number of units in which the coalition payoff is made available, and by manipulating the way people are allowed to interact. Results of three experiments showed that when the coalition payoff was such that members of each possible coalition could obtain an equitable payoff share, the outcome tended to be coalitions that also maximized the payoff of its members. However, when the payoff was such that people had to make trade-offs between maximizing their payoff share and obtaining an equitable payoff share, it took longer to form a coalition and it was harder to maintain a coalition. Moreover, depending on the way people were allowed to interact, the final outcome was a coalition that maximized the payoff of its members or a coalition that provided them with an equitable payoff share. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Attitudinal ambivalence extends the traditional unidimensional conceptualization of attitude by acknowledging that people can simultaneously evaluate attitude objects as positive and negative. The present paper argues that this bidimensional view of attitudes may be extended further to take account of multidimensional influences on attitudes using measures of belief homogeneity. Study 1 (n = 155) showed that attitudes based on homogeneous belief-sets were significantly more predictive of subsequent behaviour (β = 0.47, p<0.01) than were attitudes based on heterogeneous belief-sets (β = 0.08, ns). Study 2 (n = 136) manipulated belief homogeneity and found that when beliefs were made heterogeneous, attitudes based on heterogeneous belief-sets were significantly less predictive of behavioural intentions (β = 0.46, p < 0.01) than attitudes based on homogeneous belief-sets (β = 0.84, p < 0.01). Implications for research on attitudinal ambivalence and attribute importance are discussed. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The classification of perfumes as ‘women's’ and ‘men's’ fragrances is based on certain gender stereotypes. In two experiments, female and male participants were asked to assume the role of a manager. In Experiment 1, they read an application for the position of a junior manager written by a male or female job applicant. Application papers were prepared with a typically masculine perfume, a typically feminine perfume or no perfume at all (control group). In Experiment 2, participants conducted a job interview with a female or male applicant (a confederate) who had applied the respective perfume or no perfume. Persons with a typically masculine perfume were ‘employed’ with a higher degree of certainty compared to persons with a typically feminine perfume. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an essential part of close relationships, social support is a dynamic interactive process. This paper aims to simultaneously investigate social support-seeking and provision behaviours using the Actor-Partner Interdependence Model (APIM). Ninety-two friendship dyads participated in this study. Supportive versus negative friendship qualities were used to predict different support-seeking and support-provision behaviours during an experimental task. Cultural and gender variations were also examined. Results showed that self-reported friendship qualities influence support-seeking and provision behaviours intrapersonally and interpersonally. Female participants were more likely to provide emotion-focused support than were male participants. After accounting for friendship qualities in the dyads, there was no evidence of cultural group differences on support-seeking or provision behaviours among same-sex friends. These results demonstrate the conceptual and empirical advantages of using APIM to unpack cultural and gender variations in social support processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates how brands-through visuals-can fill a void for consumers experiencing a lack of social connection. Using psychometric measures and mock advertisements with visuals of human faces and non-faces, Study 1 shows that seeing faces relates to greater brand liking with processing fluency mediating, and individual loneliness and tendency to anthropomorphize moderating the effect. Study 2 replicates findings with other-race faces corroborating that fluency but not ethnic self-referencing underlies the effect. Study 3 complements the psychometric measures of Studies 1 and 2 with eye tracking data to demonstrate that fluency correlates with distinct patterns of attention. Study 4 uses actual brand stimuli to show that effects are robust and extend beyond advertisements. Taken together, the findings show that communicating brand names in conjunction with visuals seen by consumers as human faces can increase brand liking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we examine the role of out-group signals and in-group leader tactics in the choice and evaluation of rival in-group leader candidates. Study 1 found preference for a negotiating in-group leader over an oppositional leader, mediated by perceived leader effectiveness and prototypicality. In Study 2, participants chose a leader who had received out-group endorsement, and in Studies 3 and 4, participants chose a negotiating in-group leader where the out-group was prepared to negotiate and an oppositional leader where the out-group was not prepared to negotiate. In the latter three studies, there was evidence for participants being strategic in their choices: effects were mediated by effectiveness but not prototypicality. These findings suggest our understanding of collective action will be enriched through attention to the situational cues provided by out-groups, and to the context of competing voices of collective action leadership. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines how temporally differentiated representations of ingroup victimhood and acknowledgment of outgroup suffering relate to present intergroup attitudes. A mixed-methods research was conducted in Bulgaria where both the ethnic majority and the Bulgarian Turkish minority can be viewed as victims and perpetrators in the past. Multigroup path models (Study 1) revealed that for the majority ( N = 192) collective victimhood was positively related to social distance through reduced forgiveness and through reduced collective guilt for a different historical era. Acknowledgment of outgroup suffering, in turn, was associated with reduced social distance through heightened guilt and through forgiveness for another era. Among the Bulgarian Turks ( N = 160), the result pattern differed. Collective victimhood was unrelated to forgiveness. Moreover, the relationship between guilt and social distance was positive. Semi-directive interviews (Study 2) revealed different meanings attributed to the events by the two groups. The impact of intertwined historical representations on current-day prejudice is discussed in light of power asymmetry between groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is now substantial evidence that larger income differences in a society increase the prevalence of most of the health and social problems that tend to occur more frequently lower down the social ladder. The pathways through which human beings are sensitive to inequality are however less clear. This paper outlines the explanatory theory that we think best fits the growing but incomplete body of evidence available. Inequality appears to have its most fundamental effects on the quality of social relations-with implications affecting the prevalence of a number of psychopathologies. We suggest that human beings have two contrasting evolved social strategies: one that is adaptive to living in a dominance hierarchy and the other appropriate to more egalitarian societies based on reciprocity and cooperation. Although both strategies are used in all societies, we hypothesise that the balance between them changes with the extent of material inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the relationship between perceived ethnic, age and income diversity and neighbourhood attachment, accounting for measures of objective diversity calculated for small, individualised neighbourhoods. With data from Warsaw in Poland, we examine whether neighbourhood ties with people of different ethnicity, age and income moderate the relationship between perceived diversity and attachment. We also test affective appraisals of the environment (excitement and irritation) as a mediator between perceived diversity and attachment. Perceived ethnic diversity was positively related to neighbourhood attachment, and this link was mediated by the emotion of excitement. Perceived income diversity undermined attachment regardless of the neighbourhood ties, and this link was not mediated by affective appraisals. Perceived age diversity was related to lower neighbourhood attachment only for individuals who had few ties with neighbours of different ages. We argue that the effects of diversity may depend on the socio-cultural context, specifically on the level and meaning of diversity in a given society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quota-based selection systems are viewed as a way to overcome biases; however, they may produce negative effects on the individuals as well as on the organizations that enact said procedures. To date, the processes underlying these negative effects have been relatively neglected in the literature and thus warrant further investigation. The current paper specifically seeks to address the process through which quota-based selection policies influence applicant evaluations of the organization and ultimately their decision to pursue employment. We demonstrate that quota-based selection policies negatively impact procedural justice perceptions, which in turn influenced perceptions of anticipated organizational support, organizational prestige, and organizational attractiveness. Ultimately, these organizational evaluations worked together to predict job pursuit intentions. The findings suggest that organizations need to carefully consider how they present their selection policies to applicant pools as they may harm organizational attractiveness and job pursuit intentions. The present study comes at a timely point in the discussion and implementation of quotas in Europe, and specifically in Germany, and provides some initial insights into how organizations are likely to be affected by such policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An emerging literature suggests that the success of social movements depends, partly, on their ability to garner support from third‐party groups. One factor that appears to predict support is social movements' use of nonviolent (compared to violent) strategies to achieve their goals. However, this literature is not definitive. Herein, we report the results of a meta‐analysis of research that has assessed the effect of the use of nonviolence on third‐party support (k = 16, N = 4598). A small‐to‐moderate positive effect was observed, d = 0.25. Additionally, research that used a control or baseline comparison group suggested that using nonviolent strategies marginally (p =.090) increased people's willingness to help the movement (d = 0.17) while adopting violent strategies did not increase or decrease people's willingness to help the movement (d = −0.03). Publication bias was evidenced by bigger effect sizes of published (vs. unpublished) studies. Target (i.e., state vs. social issues) and location of the protest (i.e., domestic vs. foreign) were not significant moderators, whereas the context (i.e., real vs. hypothetical scenarios) was, although marginally. Results suggest that it behooves social movements to adopt nonviolent strategies if third‐party support is desired. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper highlights the relation between positive distinctiveness and social discrimination as key concepts in Social Identity Theory. The often replicated finding of mere categorization leading to in group favouritism and outgroup discrimination plays a major role in supporting the view that discrimination is functional for a positive social identity. The paper confronts the mere categorization effect with recent findings which throw severe doubts on its robustness. Particularly the failure to extrapolate categorization effects to intergroup behaviour involving aversive stimuli (the positive-negative-asymmetry of social discrimination) leads to the plea for further specifications of SIT and its validity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper further develops a new theory of power advanced by the authors in two previous papers (Galam and Moscovici, 1991, 1994). According to this theory power results from the build up of conflicts within a group, these conflicts requiring a degree of organizational complexity which is itself a decreasing function of group size. Within this approach, power appears to be a composite of three qualitatively different powers, institutional, generative and ecological. Levels and relationships among these forms of power are considered as a function of the diversity of the group. There exist also three states of organization associated with power evolution. At the group initial stage is the paradigmatic state. Creation and inclusion of conflicts are accomplished in the transitional state through the building of complexity. At a critical value of diversity, the group moves into the agonal state in which institutional power vanishes simultaneously with the fusion of generative and ecological powers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines three issues concerning the frequently negative correlation between formal education and ethnic prejudice, namely its reliability, its validity and the manner in which it is mediated. Reliability is demonstrated across three indices of ethnic attitudes in seven representative samples drawn from four European countries (West Germany, Netherlands, France, Great Britain; total N=3788). The Hypothesis that this correlation reflects only the tendency of more highly educated respondents to give more socially desirable answers and not true attitude differences was inconsistent with the finding from the survey data that educational level also correlated negatively with responses to an index of subtle prejudice. Results from an experiment employing the bogus pipeline procedure similarly refute this hypothesis, indicating that significant education-related differences in expressed prejudice remain under conditions in which the tendency to give socially desirable responses is reduced. Finally, path analysis based on the survey data show that part but not all of the association between low education and ethnic prejudice is mediated by social psychological variables. Particularly group relative deprivation, perceived belief incongruency, political conservation, and acception of inter-ethnic contact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops, measures, and tests two types of intergroup prejudice--blatant and subtle. Blatant prejudice is the traditional, often studied form; it is hot, close and direct. subtle prejudice is the modern form; it is cool, distant and indirect. Using data from seven independent national samples from western Europe, we constructed 10-item scales in four languages to measure each of these varieties of prejudice. We report the properties, structure and correlates of both scales across the seven samples, and make initial checks of their validity. The cross-nationally consistent result support the value of the blatant-subtle distinction as two varieties of prejudice. While they share many correlates, their distinctive differences suggest better specification of these correlates of prejudice. And the blatant-subtle distinction also aids in more precise specification of the effects of effects of prejudice on attitudes toward immigrants. The paper closes with a normative interpretation of Subtle Prejudice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three studies were conducted in order to investigate antecedents of individuals' preoccupation with person descriptors, such as personality traits, physical-ethnic characteristics, or external characteristics, in Studies 1 and 2 subjects had to rate, for a given list of traits, how important each of the traits was as a prerequisite for performance within an academic context. Subjects who Here relatively inexperienced in writing term papers (Study 1) or in taking major exams (Study 2) showed a higher mean in rated importance of the traits than did those who were relatively experienced However, no differences between experienced and inexperienced subjects occurred if they had to rate the same trait list with respect to each trait's general desirability, i.e. where the traits were simply rated as such, without any reference to a performance realm. This finding clarifies an important aspect of the theory underlying this work, in the third study subjects were encouraged to make use of overt, visible aspects in describing how to recognize a foreign language speaker. The number of physical ethnic and material characteristics mentioned in subjects' descriptions was positively correlated with the number of mistakes subjects made in a foreign-language translation task, particularly when subjectively felt press with respect to translating was high and subjects' performance in translating was salient. Implications of these findings are discussed within a concept framework dwelling on the societal origins of the use of person-descriptor terms (Wicklund, 1986a,b). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper contains an investigation about research of Dutch social psychologists. Based on reported publications two types of analyses were performed. The reported publications were categorized by means of a topic-inventory proposed by Fisch and Daniel (1982), which enabled us to compare Dutch trends with developments in Europe and the U.S.A. Moreover, by means of bibliometric analyses publications of Dutch social psychologists were related to data obtained by the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI). Several trends were observed and discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]