United as one? Personal and social identity threats differentially predict cooperation and prejudice toward minorities

ABSTRACT

Global threats are often identified as triggers of intergroup conflict. However, personal vs. social identity threats can differently shape intergroup relations – enhancing or decreasing cooperation and prejudice. We tested the idea that appraisals of different types of threat (to personal vs. social identity motives) shape specific representations of intergroup relations (as one-group recategorization or separate-group coalition), which have opposing implications for modern prejudice toward ethnic minorities. In four studies (N = 2,772) performed in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, we found evidence that personal threats were negatively associated with modern prejudice and this relation was mediated by preferences for separate group-representations, whereas social identity threats were positively associated with modern prejudice and mediated by preferences for one group representations.

KEYWORDS:

• Personal and social identity threats
• personal and collective control
• recategorization
• coalitions
• modern prejudice

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

Data files and preregistrations for all studies are available on OSF: https://osf.io/mr46v/?view_only=12250765c66740d1aeaac3be11b9958f

Ethics Approval Statement

All research described in this manuscript adheres to ethical guidelines specified in the APA Code of Conduct and received an ethics approval from the Research Ethics Committee at the Institute of Psychology, Jagiellonian University (KE_09102019). Informed consent was obtained from all participants who took part in the studies.

Supplemental material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/15298868.2024.2336939

Notes

1. We apply the notions of one-group vs. separate-groups representations of intergroup relations to label the variables of interest. On a theoretical level, one group representation refers to a recategorization of different groups as one common-ingroup, whereas separate groups representations refer to a coalition between different groups.

2. Study 1 was part of a larger research project which had different research goals, not related to this line of research. Predictions and pre-registrations for all Studies: 1–4, together with all datasets and supplementary materials are available at Open Science Framework: https://osf.io/mr46v/?view_only=12250765c66740d1aeaac3be11b9958f.

3. We used 7 items taken from the Self-Mastery Scale (Pearlin & Schooler, 1978) and 3 items measuring personal control (Greenaway et al., 2015). Reliabilities for all scales used in Study 1 are reported in Table S1 in the Supplementary Materials. These scales were used for exploratory purposes, so the results are not presented here.

4. The minorities chosen as target groups were: Ukrainians, Roma, Vietnamese and Jews (in Poland), Gypsy people, Latin Americans, Arabs and Asians (in Spain), Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis and Africans/Afro-Caribbeans (in the U.K.) as well as immigrants from Albania and from the countries of the former Soviet Union such as Ukraine and Georgia (in Greece).

5. We also included some additional measures, not related to the purpose of this research. All of them are mentioned in the preregistration document and described in detail in the Supplementary Materials.

6. This study was part of a separate research project, thus the preregistration document described different research goals, which are not related to this line of research. These predictions and the detailed procedure description are available at OSF: https://osf.io/mr46v/?view_only=12250765c66740d1aeaac3be11b9958f.

7. Additional measures contained: Spheres of Control Scale (Paulhus & Van Selst, 1990), Ingroup Norms and Attitudes Towards Minorities.

8. ChA stands for Chinese Americans and BA for Black Americans.

9. One-item entitativity measure, similarity with minorities using Venn diagrams and Commonality Measure (“White and Black Americans have a lot in common”). Identification with White Americans and Americans in general as well as the solidarity measure adapted from Leach et al. (2008) and political orientation was assessed.

10. In the preregistration (https://osf.io/mr46v/?view_only=12250765c66740d1aeaac3be11b9958f) the items referring to a one-group representation are labeled as “recategorization” and to a separate-groups representation as “coalitions.” Also, we included a prediction for a moderated mediation analysis with perceived entitativity and multicultural ideology as moderators to test for boundary conditions of the observed effects. We do not include these results in the manuscript since the sample size could not provide sufficient statistical power for testing such a complex model.

11. We based this selection criterion on the spheres of control theory, which distinguishes personal and social domains of control (Paulhus & Christie, 1981). In order to test our predictions regarding the impact of personal control threat on the variables of interest, we could only consider those participants who clearly referred to personal control and not control over other people or groups and institutions (e.g., governmental regulations) since this would create a confound between personal and collective levels of control.

12. Entitativity and Diversity single item measures, identification with Americans as a nation, colorblindness and multiculturalism scales, political preference measures.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Polish National Science Centre grant 2018/30/M/HS6/00298 awarded to the first author, and by Grant PID2022.141182NB.I00 funded by MICIU/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 ERDF/EU and awarded to the second author. Additionally, the third author was supported by the Foundation for Polish Science (FNP) and also by a Polish Social Psychological Society (PSPS) Young Researchers Grant (Study 2).