PSYC3002 Lecture 11: Group Emotions & Collective Action PDF

The Social Psychology of Group Processes & Social Change PSYC3002 Lecture 11: Group Emotions & Collective Action Dr Charlie Crimston [email protected] Semester 1 SELT - survey journey The Student Experience of Learning & Teaching survey allows students to give feedback on their courses an...

The Social Psychology of Group Processes & Social Change PSYC3002 Lecture 11: Group Emotions & Collective Action Dr Charlie Crimston [email protected] Semester 1 SELT - survey journey The Student Experience of Learning & Teaching survey allows students to give feedback on their courses and teachers. It is voluntary and confidential, and run by the Institutional Research (IR) team. 20 May – Survey opens Check your email or Wattle page for available surveys 16 June - Survey closes IR team perform screening of comments for welfare concerns Survey runs for 4 weeks Please provide constructive and respectful feedback (your teacher can’t identify you) 27 June Grades are released to students Find out more on the Info for Students webpage: https://services.anu.edu.au/learning-teaching/educationdata/student-experience-of-learning-teaching-selt/information-for TEQSA PROVIDER ID: PRV12002 (AUSTRALIAN UNIVERSITY) | CRICOS PROVIDER CODE: 00120C 8 July SELT feedback is made available to teachers and course convenors to improve future course delivery THE STORY SO FAR… ▪ Intergroup & intragroup theories ▪ The social identity approach ▪ Ingroup bias & misinformation ▪ Deviance & dissent ▪ Stereotypes, prejudice & discrimination ▪ Applied leadership ▪ Extreme group norms ▪ Polarisation and conflict TODAY… ▪ Group based emotions ▪ Collective guilt ▪ Victimhood ▪ Collective action ▪ Injustice ▪ Identification ▪ Agency ▪ Minority change ▪ Moral expansion “WE SAY SORRY” GROUP-BASED EMOTIONS “Australians of this generation should not be required to accept guilt and blame for past actions and policies over which they had no control.” GROUP-BASED EMOTIONS ▪ “Massey University is offering grief counselling for dejected rugby fans in the wake of the crushing All Blacks World Cup defeat. The Palmerston North campus…has released a list of five experts who may be able to help those struggling to cope with this major national disaster.” GROUP-BASED EMOTIONS ▪ Group-based emotions o represent the experience of a variety of different affective states derived from one’s psychological membership in a particular group; o are often contingent on the relative value of the group membership, its success or failure, and/or its positive or negative deeds. DO PEOPLE EXPERIENCE GROUP-BASED EMOTIONS? ▪ Sport-Fan Emotions: #1 o Sport fans provided self-reports of positive emotions after game. o Happy, pleased, energetic, satisfied, confident o Level of team social identification was measured. o Level of social identification significantly predicted emotions. DO PEOPLE EXPERIENCE GROUP-BASED EMOTIONS? ▪ Sport-Fan Emotions: #2 o Sport fans provided self-reports of o “cognitive anxiety” (e.g., worry), o “For important and unimportant games o At five different times. o Level of team social identification was measured. 25 Low Social Identification High Social Identification Cognitive Anxiety 20 15 10 5 0 3 days before 12 hours before 3 hours before immediately prior to at half-time DO PEOPLE EXPERIENCE GROUP-BASED EMOTIONS? ▪ National Group Members’ Emotions o Americans watched “Rocky IV” film clip o Measured blood pressure before and after watching film. o Level of American social identification was measured. Diastolic Blood Pressure (Between Heart Beats) 74 72 Low Social Identification High Social Identification 70 68 66 64 62 60 Pre-Film Post-Film Systolic Blood Pressure (Pressure when Heart is Beating) 114 112 Low Social Identification High Social Identification 110 108 106 104 102 100 Pre-Film Post-Film CAN GROUP MEMBERS FEEL “COLLECTIVE GUILT”? ▪ Minimal Group Study (The Netherlands) o Group members told that previous group members had been: o consistently fair in their treatment of an out-group o consistently unfair in their treatment of an out-group CAN GROUP MEMBERS FEEL “COLLECTIVE GUILT”? ▪ Minimal Group Study (The Netherlands) Measured collective guilt o o “I feel guilty about the negative things (my ingroup) have done to (the outgroup).” o “I feel regret for my group’s harmful past actions toward (the outgroup).” o “I can easily feel guilty about the bad outcomes received by (outgroup members) that were brought about by (ingroup members) in the past.” CAN GROUP MEMBERS FEEL “COLLECTIVE GUILT”? ▪ Minimal Group Study (The Netherlands) o Level of social identification positively related to collective guilt. o o 14.5% of variance in collective guilt Those in low group bias condition felt less guilt (M = 2.64) than those in the high group bias condition (M = 3.37). COLLECTIVE GUILT AND THE NATURE OF INTERGROUP COMPARISONS ▪ Relative In-Group Advantage (Australia) Measured perceived relative advantage among European-Australians o o “Do you think non-First Nation Australians are advantaged, or disadvantaged?” Measured collective guilt o o “I feel a sense of shame when I think of how non-First Nation Australians have treated First Nations people.” COLLECTIVE GUILT AND THE NATURE OF INTERGROUP COMPARISONS 7 Collective Guilt 6 5 4 3 2 1 Out-Group Advantaged Both Groups Equal In-Group Advantaged COLLECTIVE GUILT AND THE NATURE OF INTERGROUP COMPARISONS ▪ In-group Privilege vs. Out-group Disadvantage (U.S.A.) o Manipulated perceptions of White privilege and Black disadvantage o “White Americans enjoy many privileges that Black Americans do not.” o “Black Americans face many disadvantages that White Americans do not.” COLLECTIVE GUILT AND THE NATURE OF INTERGROUP COMPARISONS ▪ o In-group Privilege vs. Out-group Disadvantage (U.S.A.) Participants in the in-group privilege frame expressed higher levels of collective guilt (M = 4.68) than those in the out-group disadvantage frame (M = 3.95). IS COLLECTIVE GUILT RELATED TO OTHER INTERGROUP ATTITUDES? ▪ Predicting Racist Attitudes (U.S.A.) o In the same study as the previous slide, o higher levels of collective guilt were associated with lower levels of racist attitudes. IS COLLECTIVE GUILT RELATED TO OTHER INTERGROUP ATTITUDES? ▪ Predicting Racist Attitudes (Australia) o Community sample o Measured o Negative attitudes toward Indigenous Australians o Gender o Education level o Political position (“right” / “left”) o Empathic Concern o Affective & Cognitive perspective-taking o Collective guilt IS COLLECTIVE GUILT RELATED TO OTHER INTERGROUP ATTITUDES? ▪ o Predicting Racist Attitudes (Australia) After controlling for all other variables, higher levels of collective guilt were associated with more favourable attitudes toward Indigenous Australians. IS COLLECTIVE GUILT RELATED TO OTHER INTERGROUP ATTITUDES? ▪ Support of Compensation: Study 1 (Australia) o Psychology students (UQ) o Higher levels of collective guilt regarding treatment of Indigenous Australians were related to stronger support for compensatory actions. IS COLLECTIVE GUILT RELATED TO OTHER INTERGROUP ATTITUDES? ▪ Support of Compensation: Study 2 (Australia) o Perth residents o Higher levels of collective guilt regarding treatment of Indigenous Australians were related to stronger support for compensatory actions. o However, no direct effect on own willingness to act. AUSTRALIA DAY OR INVASION DAY? ▪ What is the role of collective memories? ▪ Two groups ▪ Protestors vs. non-protestors ▪ 1. recognition of colonial history ▪ 2. lower perceived continuity ▪ Need greater recognition of the ongoing impact of past atrocities ON THE RELATIVE SALIENCE OF THE IN-GROUP AS THE VICTIM ▪ Jewish Reminder of Holocaust (U.S.A.) o Jewish & Christian participants reminded of either o Nazi genocide against Jews (6 million killed) o Cambodian genocide (2 million killed) ON THE RELATIVE SALIENCE OF THE IN-GROUP AS THE VICTIM ▪ Jewish Reminder of Holocaust (U.S.A.) o Measures o Collective guilt in Israeli-Palestinian conflict o “All Jews should feel guilty about the harm done to Palestinians during the conflict.” o “Israelis should feel guilty about the bad things that have happened to Palestinians during the conflict.” o Responsibility o “I believe that the current actions of the Palestinians are in response to Israeli oppression.” 7 Christians (Jewish Guilt) Jews (Jewish Guilt) Christians (Jewish/Israeli Responsibility) Jews (Jewish/Israeli Responsibility) 6 5 4 3 2 1 Cambodia Holocaust CONCLUSIONS AND PROCESSES ▪ o ▪ Group members will and do experience emotions associated with their group memberships. These emotions can include happiness, anxiety, and guilt. Collective guilt is associated with more positive out-group attitudes, and preferences for compensation for past wrongdoings. CONCLUSIONS AND PROCESSES ▪ Group-based emotions make psychological sense once we understand that: o people have both personal and social identities, o the adoption of any given social identity involves psychological depersonalization, and o depersonalization leads to a variety of group-based behaviours and groupbased emotions. CONCLUSIONS AND PROCESSES ▪ The nature of the comparison (ingroup advantage vs. out-group disadvantage) and a sense of ingroup victimization can affect levels of collective guilt and, hence, in-group responsibility. Brendan Nelson “Aboriginal Australians continue to die long before the rest of us. Alcohol, welfare without responsibilities, isolation from the economic mainstream, corrupt management of resources, nepotism, political buck-passing between governments with divided responsibilities, lack of home ownership, under-policing and tolerance by authorities of neglect and abuse of children that violates all we stand for, all combine to still see too many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people living lives of existential aimlessness.” Outgroup disadvantage “We cannot from the comfort of the twenty first century begin to imagine what they overcame - Indigenous and non Indigenous - to give us what we have and make us who we are. We do know though that language, disease, ignorance, good intentions, basic human prejudices, and a cultural and technological chasm combined to deliver a harshness exceeded only by the land over which each sought to prevail.” Ingroup victimhood COLLECTIVE ACTION & SOCIAL CHANGE PREJUDICE REDUCTION AS SOCIAL CHANGE? ▪ Micro-level prejudice reduction strategies may be ineffective on their own – connected to wider society low status/disadvantage. ▪ Need political social action from existing political and government authorities or from individuals and social movements working for change. ▪ The ultimate challenge for reducing prejudice and discrimination may involve creating and facilitating the conditions under which such action can take place. COLLECTIVE ACTION: CHANGING MATERIAL RELATIONS ▪ ▪ Prejudice and discrimination o have their basis in real intergroup relations; o can be reduced by either: o cooperation for a superordinate goal, or o self-categorizing at a superordinate level of identity while recognizing subgroup identities. However, it is sometimes necessary to change the relations between the groups in another manner. o Intergroup cooperation may simply not be a viable option. COLLECTIVE ACTION: CHANGING MATERIAL RELATIONS ▪ Social protest has three important components: o The construction or re-construction of collective beliefs, o The transformation of discontent into collective action, o The formation and maintenance of commitment to a movement. COLLECTIVE ACTION: CHANGING MATERIAL RELATIONS ▪ “Collective action frames”: o are sets of action-oriented beliefs and meanings that inspire and legitimate social protest; o underpin much of the three social-protest components; o comprise o a sense of injustice, o an element of identity, o a factor of agency. UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF (IN)JUSTICE ▪ Perceived Unfairness and Protest Support in Three Samples o British University students o The more tuition fees were seen as unfair, the more participants supported: o Normative action (e.g., demonstrations, sign complaint) o Non-violent, non-normative action (e.g., block university buildings, block the highway) o But NOT non-normative violent action (e.g., throw stones, arson attacks) UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF (IN)JUSTICE ▪ Perceived Unfairness and Protest Support in Three Samples Muslim Indian University students o The more Muslims were seen as disadvantaged and Hindus advantaged, the more participants supported: o o Policy change (e.g., increased government funds for Muslim community) o Violent action (e.g., “I have sympathy for some Muslim groups’ reasons to resort to violent means in general, even though I do not condone the violence itself.”) UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF (IN)JUSTICE ▪ o Fairness as System Legitimacy: Individual Mobility vs. Subgroup Enhancement (Canada) “Visible” minority immigrants responded to individual assimilation questions and subgroup enhancement questions. UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF (IN)JUSTICE ▪ Fairness as System Legitimacy: Individual Mobility vs. Subgroup Enhancement (Canada) Individual mobility was predicted by: o o Self-esteem (negatively). o Perceived legitimacy of the Canadian social system. Subgroup enhancement was predicted by: o o Group discrimination. o Years in Canada. o Neighbourhood ethnic density. o Conservatism. UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF (IN)JUSTICE ▪ Considering justice & protest via relative deprivation (Australia) o Personal relative deprivation o Perceived discrepancies between one’s own personal expectations and attainments. o Expectations are often derived through social comparison processes. o Collective relative deprivation o Perceived discrepancies between one’s own group and other more privileged groups. UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF (IN)JUSTICE ▪ Considering justice & protest via relative deprivation (Australia) o Unemployed respondents indicated: o their personal relative position (worst to best) and their group’s (i.e., unemployed) relative position in terms of outcomes; o their current stress levels; o their potential for non-normative (e.g., “approve of sit-ins, mass demonstrations, etc.” “approve of disobeying an unjust law”). UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF (IN)JUSTICE ▪ Considering justice & protest via relative deprivation (Australia) o Personal relative deprivation predicted stress but not protest orientation. o Collective relative deprivation predicted protest orientation but not stress. o Overall, a group-level variable was a better predictor of protest orientation than an individual-level variable. Correlation with Willingness to Participate in Collective Action Gay men indicate willingness to participate in collective action (U.S.A.) 0.6 UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF SOCIAL IDENTIFICATION 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 -0.1 Collective Motive Social Motive Personal Reward Identification with gay people Identification with gay movement UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF SOCIAL IDENTIFICATION ▪ The Role of Social Identification and Threat (Australia) o Union members’ willingness to engage in union activities. o Survey described as : o survey of attitudes (control condition); o survey of attitudes in light of changes in government policies (conflict condition); o survey of attitudes in light of changes in government policies that could threaten the welfare of working people (conflict + threat condition). ▪ The Role of Social Identification and Threat (Australia) Willingness to Participate in Union Activities 6 Low Social Identification High Social Identification 5 4 3 2 1 Control Conflict Conflict+Threat AGENCY AND BARRIERS TO PROTEST ▪ o Collective Efficacy and Social Identification (U.K.) University students asked social identification with university, collective efficacy, and support for a protest against increases in campus food prices. AGENCY AND BARRIERS TO PROTEST ▪ Collective Efficacy and Social Identification (U.K.) o Both collective efficacy and social identification were independently correlated with support for the protest. o However, in a multiple regression, only social identification, and the interaction between social identification and collective efficacy were significant. o Analyses showed that collective efficacy predicted support only for high social identifiers. AGENCY AND BARRIERS TO PROTEST ▪ Quotas as effective barriers to collective protest (Canada) o Subjects placed in an “unsophisticated” group. o Subjects were told that: o o they could work their way into the sophisticated group; o there was a 30% quota for sophisticated group entry; o there was a 2% quota for sophisticated group entry; o entry into the sophisticated group was closed. Told that they did not get into sophisticated group. ▪ Quotas as effective barriers to collective protest (Canada) Open 30% Quota 2% Quota Closed 10 9 8 Mean Rating 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Acceptance Individual Retest Individual Protest Collective Retest Collective Protest HOW DO MINORITIES PRODUCE CHANGE? Serge Moscovici’s “genetic” model ▪ influence is not unilateral but reciprocal (i.e., minorities and majorities influence each other) ▪ influence is related to the production and resolution of conflict ▪ people do not like conflict ▪ minorities can exploit this by creating, accentuating, or drawing attention to conflict ▪ only way to reduce conflict is for the majority to change ▪ key to the success of minority lies in behavioural style! HOW DO MINORITIES PRODUCE CHANGE? ▪ Most important component of behavioural style is consistency. Minorities must propose a clear position on an issue and hold firmly to it ▪ Two aspects to consistency ▪ diachronic consistency = consistency over time ▪ synchronic consistency = consistency within the minority EFFECTS OF A CONSISTENT MINORITY 1. disrupts the majority norm 2. draws attention to the minority as an entity 3. draws attention to an alternative point of view 4. demonstrates certainty and commitment to that point of view 5. highlights that the only solution to conflict is adoption of the minority point of view MORAL EXPANSION WHAT DO OUR MORAL BOUNDARIES LOOK LIKE? Crimston, Bain, Hornsey, & Bastian (2016). Individual differences Target Attributes Contextual Factors Cognitive Factors CAN WE EXPAND OUR MORAL BOUNDARIES? “the minority is always stronger than the majority, because the minority is generally formed by those who really have an opinion, while the strength of the majority is illusory” Soren Kierkegaard (1850) ▪ Q1. How can collective guilt be best leveraged to produce social change? REVISION QUESTIONS ▪ Q2. What are the important components of social protest? ▪ Q3. What is the best ways for minority groups to drive collective change? ▪ Q4. What role does knowledge of history in relation to past atrocities play in influencing attitudes to change? ▪ Q5. What drives moral expansion? 66 SOME READINGS ▪ Hakim, H., Branscombe, N., & Schoemann, A. (2021). Group-based emotions and support for reparations: A meta-analysis. Affective Science, 2, 363-378. https://dor.org/10.1007/s42761-021-00055-9 ▪ Selvanathan, H. P., Jetten, J., & Crimston, C. R. (2022). Australia day or invasion day? Perspectives on the continuing impact of colonialism underlies public contestations round Australia's national day. Political Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12818 67 NEXT WEEK: SLEEP IN! THANK YOU!