135 research outputs found
COVID-19 Threat and Uncertainty: How Outcome Anticipation Shapes Responses to the Unknown
No full textUncertainty was a common theme in political speeches, fundraising emails, and TV advertisements throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. The anxiety and distress felt by many all over the world was presumed to be directly tied to the uncertainty surrounding the pandemic. Yet, these negative feelings cannot be extricated from the negative outcomes associated with COVID-19: Serious illness, death, loss of a loved one, loss of a job, and loss of education for one's child, among others. In this chapter, we posit that negative feelings about the uncertainty engendered by the COVID-19 pandemic are due not to the uncertainty itself, but rather to expectations of negative outcomes to the pandemic, informed in part by people's past experiences. We bolster this argument using experimental data as well as findings that people who were less at risk for negative outcomes during the pandemic (e.g., those with a higher socioeconomic status) experienced less distress about it, and that people who were more at risk (e.g., people with chronic illness, healthcare professionals) experienced more distress. We also highlight the role of optimism and resilience in predicting more positive reactions to uncertain situations, including COVID-19, demonstrating that people's expectations of both positive outcomes and their own abilities to cope with potential negative outcomes inform their reactions to uncertainty
Molinario, E., Amicone G., Piccinin G., Fornara F., Bonaiuto M. (in press). La relazione tra persona e ambienti caveali nella prospettiva della psicologia ambientale. In: P. Guarini, P. V. Dell’Aira. NUOVI CICLI DI VITA PER LE AREE EX-ESTRATTIVE Strategie di valorizzazione dei siti di cava nel Parco Regionale dell’Appia Antica. Quodlibet.
No full textPolitical violence promoted by conspiracy beliefs: empirical application of the 3N model of radicalization.
No full textExtremism and political violence: the mediated effect of epistemic and significance motivations.
No full textThis study analyzes the motivational processes underlying political group extremism, namely a
willful collective behavior that violates the norms of expected conduct in a given context (Levine
& Kruglanski, 2022; Kruglanski et al., 2017). Extremist conducts are produced by a motivational
imbalance (Kruglanski et al., 2022), where one dominant need—the quest for personal
significance (QFS)—overrides all the others. Following Levine and Kruglanski (2022) and Hogg
(2021), another antecedent hypothesized for group extremism is the individuals’ desire for
certain, clear-cut and ambiguity-free knowledge (need for cognitive closure, NFC, Kruglanski &
Webster, 1996), since the absence of such knowledge poses a major threat to people’s self-
esteem as valuable and competent social actors. Both needs have been associated with extreme
political worldviews (Jasko, et al., 2020, Webber et al., 2018). In this vein, we argue that such
existential (QFS) and epistemic (NFC) needs are associated to non-normative political
engagement (Moskalenko & McCauley, 2009) through the mediation effect of motivational
extremism (ME). In two correlational samples (n 1 = 567, n 2 = 764), we observed how ME was
associated to the QFS and the NFC. In turn, such needs exerted an indirect effect on non-
normative engagement, partially (QFS) or totally (NFC) mediated by ME. According to this
argument, the results showed that the relation between epistemic / significance-affirming
motivations and non-normative political engagement was mediated by extremism conceived as
motivational imbalance. Specifically, while the QFS showed both direct and indirect effects on
engagement, NFC showed indirect effect only
sj-docx-1-pss-10.1177_0956797621996668 – Supplemental material for Ideological Extremism Among Syrian Refugees Is Negatively Related to Intentions to Migrate to the West
No full textSupplemental material, sj-docx-1-pss-10.1177_0956797621996668 for Ideological Extremism Among Syrian Refugees Is Negatively Related to Intentions to Migrate to the West by Katarzyna Jasko, David Webber, Erica Molinario, Arie W. Kruglanski and Katherine Touchton-Leonard in Psychological Science</p
Significance loss and political vs. religious terrorism: a textual analysis
No full textDrawing on Significance Quest Theory, we applied the LIWC-based textual analysis to the Honor Dictionary to investigate lone-actors terrorists’ rhetoric. Specifically, we examined texts from the Extremist Manifesto Database (EMD) and compared writings by terrorists driven by political ideologies (left & right-wing, ethno-nationalists, and anti-government, N=65) with those of terrorists motivated by religious ideologies (N=23). Given that religious extremists are particularly sensitive to honor threats, we expected that religious terrorists’ rhetoric would have been more tinged in honor loss than political terrorists’ one. Indeed, we found that lone-actor religious terrorists' rhetoric, compared to lone-actors’ political one, contained more honor-loss words. Contrary to our predictions instead, we did not find any difference with respect to honor-gain words. Notably, this is the first research to use the Honor Dictionary to linguistically measure the activation of the need for significance, demonstrating a strong correlation with extreme ideologies endorsement. Further, our research supports the hypothesis that extreme ideologists’ rhetoric reflects significance loss feelings
Why Populism Attracts: On the Allure of Certainty and Dignity.
No full textIn the chapter a definition of populism is proposed through an analysis of its roots. Research literature is then analyzed to highlight how relative deprivation, loss of status, and economic pressures evoke negative feelings and motivate people to action that can lead to populism, seen as a way of addressing those frustrations. Some of the basic needs are presented, linked to a psycho-social perspective and considered at the basis of populism itself. The universal structuring of populism and its specific socio-cultural characterization are then illustrated with particular attention to the US and Italy. Finally, two studies are presented, conducted in the two countries. The results support the hypotheses that the appeal of populism is predominantly driven by two basic motivations, that for certainty and coherence and that for personal significance. Knowing their role can make intervention for overcoming populist pressures more effective
Navigating uncertainty: how war and COVID-19 threats shape populist sentiment through need for cognitive closure
No full textSocial crises and threatening situations can undermine the sense of certainty leading individuals to seek self-affirming means such as subscribing to belief systems and ideologies that are unambiguous, all-encompassing, and explanatory such as populism. In two cross-sectional datasets collected in Italy one year apart, we tested the indirect effect of different kinds of threats (i.e., threats related to COVID-19 and the Russia-Ukraine Conflict) on populist attitudes through Need for Cognitive Closure (Webster & Kruglanski, 1994, NFCC). In 2022 (N = 1668), we found that both the perceived threat posed by COVID-19 and the threat posed by the Russia-Ukraine Conflict were positively related to NFCC, which in turn was positively related to high levels of populist attitudes. When controlling for the indirect effect of NFCC, COVID-19 threat still held a significant direct effect on populist attitudes, suggesting a partial mediation. The effect of the threat related to the ongoing war on populist attitudes was fully mediated by NFCC. In 2023 (N = 1152), similarly to what we found in the data collected in 2022, the effect of the COVID-19 threat on populist attitudes was partially mediated by NFCC. Whereas the effect of the threat posed by the war was not mediated by NFCC, but directly and positively linked to populist attitudes. Our findings highlighted how populism serves an explanatory function and sense-making when uncertainty arouses from threatening circumstances. Moreover, they underscore the importance of considering contextual variations and distinct threat types when exploring the dynamics of threat perception, and cognitive processes such as perception of uncertainty, and populist attitudes. The results are discussed in light of the relevant literature on threats and the circumstances at the time of the data collection
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