European Journal of Social Psychology

Mumbanza Ngeke, Joseph; Licata, Laurent; Toma, Claudia

doi: 10.1002/ejsp.70058pmid: N/A

Belief in gender discrimination is a key predictor of employees’ attitudes toward gender equality policies in organizations. We hypothesized that this belief increases men's support for gender equality policies but decreases women's support due to the perception of organizational hypocrisy. Across three studies—two correlational (N = 420; N = 669) and one experimental (N = 420)—we found evidence for a dual pathway: Among men, stronger belief in gender discrimination was associated with greater support for gender equality policies; among women, the same belief was associated with increased perception of organizational hypocrisy, which, in turn, reduced their support. These findings highlight the importance of fostering men's awareness of gender discrimination while ensuring that organizational efforts are perceived as authentic to maintain women's support.

Aikawa, Maho; Stewart, Andrew L.

doi: 10.1002/ejsp.70069pmid: N/A

The current research focused on how competing narratives (i.e., dominant and resistance narratives) are endorsed among low‐status group members, through the case of the US military base issue in Okinawa, Japan. Specifically, we explored patterns of Okinawans’ narrative endorsement (i.e., dominant and resistance narratives surrounding the presence of US military in Okinawa), as well as their behavioural responses (e.g., resistance and compliance) using survey responses of Okinawan participants (N = 172). Following the identification of factors in narrative endorsement and behavioural responses through exploratory factor analyses, we identified narrative profiles of participants through a latent profile analysis. Then, we mapped narrative profiles, behavioural responses and social positions (i.e., gender, age and educational background) in understanding the relationship among these constructs. The results revealed that participants’ narrative endorsement was often ambivalent, as many of them endorsed both dominant and resistance narratives to some degree. The results also showed that participants’ narrative profile was significantly related to their behavioural responses. Implications regarding the conceptualization of narrative endorsement and its behavioural consequences are further discussed.

Wood, Natasha R.; Wicks, Sydney G.; Beam, Adam J.; Mudryk, Elijah P.; Bray, Ellie; Hales, Andrew H.

doi: 10.1002/ejsp.70066pmid: N/A

Romantic partners are instrumental to more goals than friends, and therefore, people have more to lose when denied a romantic relationship than a friendship. We explored people's forecasted and experienced rejection by a potential romantic partner or friend. In Study 1, participants (N = 1500) reported their lay beliefs about which experience would hurt more. Twice as many people indicated that potential romantic (vs. friend) rejection would be worse. In Studies 2 and 3, participants (N = 934, 477 respectively) were accepted or rejected by potential romantic partners or friends. The source of the exclusion did not impact participants’ forecasted or experienced affect or needs satisfaction. However, participants overestimated the pain of exclusion. Despite believing romantic rejection would hurt more when directly comparing it to platonic rejection and forecasting an exaggeration of this hurt, exclusion appears universally painful, and the potential relationship between the source and target matters little.

Borinca, Islam; Tankır, Esra Yalçın; Barqa, Furat; Cakal, Huseyin

doi: 10.1002/ejsp.70065pmid: N/A

As global conflicts intensify, observers without direct conflict experience are increasingly exposed to war‐related suffering through media coverage, yet little is known about how such exposure shapes emotional and behavioural responses or how support for different affected civilian groups is distributed. This research examines the emotional and cognitive mechanisms underlying solidarity among observers who have not directly experienced these conflicts as combatants, refugees or residents of conflict zones, focusing on the Ukrainian–Russian and Israeli–Palestinian conflicts. Across four experiments, we tested whether exposure to civilian suffering elicits empathy, perceived injustice and solidarity‐based action intentions. Experiments 1 (N = 225, Irish participants) and 2 (N = 425, diverse European participants) demonstrated that exposure to Ukrainian suffering, relative to a control condition, increased empathy and interpersonal solidarity‐based action, with empathy mediating these effects even when controlling for political ideology and European identity. Experiment 3 (N = 496, UK participants) introduced a Palestinian suffering condition and collective solidarity‐based action measures, showing that exposure increased empathy and support for the target group, with stronger effects for Ukrainians. In this experiment, relative empathy mediated these effects. Experiment 4 (N = 349, UK participants, preregistered) employed a fully crossed 2 × 2 design including all four groups, Ukrainians, Russians, Palestinians and Israelis, and introduced perceived injustice. Exposure to civilian suffering increased empathy, perceived injustice and collective action, with stronger effects for Palestinian, relative to Israeli, suffering. Cross‐conflict interactions further showed that viewing Palestinian suffering increased empathy for Ukrainians, and vice versa. Serial mediation analyses confirmed that perceived injustice and empathy jointly explained support for these groups. Taken together, these findings clarify how observers without direct conflict experience emotionally and cognitively respond to armed conflicts and why some conflicts elicit greater public solidarity than others.

Weitzel, Anne I.; Unkelbach, Christian

doi: 10.1002/ejsp.70070pmid: N/A

Ecological models explain social phenomena by assuming specific properties of the world an individual lives in. The evaluative information ecology model (Unkelbach et al. 2019) assumes two such properties: Positive information is more frequent (i.e., positivity prevalence), but negative information is more diverse (i.e., negativity diversity). However, so far there is no simultaneous test of these two assumed properties. Assuming that evaluative information influences affective states, we tested these properties for people's self‐reported affective states in a preregistered experience‐sampling study. For 5–6 days, five times per day, 453 participants reported currently feeling good versus bad, before freely describing their current affective state (9413 data points). Participants reported more positive than negative affective states, supporting positivity prevalence. In the preregistered analyses, negative descriptors were also relatively more diverse—however, evidence for negativity diversity depended on the analytic method, thereby providing mixed support for negativity diversity.

Skrodzka, Magdalena; Smith, Elaine M.; Foran, Aoife‐Marie; Shelly, Catriona; Brance, Kristine; Muldoon, Orla T.

doi: 10.1002/ejsp.70075pmid: N/A

Crises have the potential to transform social identities and foster collective action, yet little is known about how new identities emerge and how a sense of shared experience (SSE) sustains mobilisation beyond immediate group contexts. The present research investigated these processes among 495 displaced Ukrainians with 107 participants completing a follow‐up 3 years later. It focused on identification and SSE with war‐affected people and intentions to engage in collective action, including support for human rights and advocacy of refugees from other conflict‐affected regions. Cross‐sectional analyses indicated that identification indirectly predicted collective action intentions through an SSE. Longitudinal analyses confirmed that identification predicted an SSE over time, relating to refugee advocacy, whereas broader human rights intentions declined. The results suggest that fostering shared experiences and identification with affected groups can sustain collective mobilisation even under prolonged and discouraging conflict conditions.

Hartwich, Lea; Becker, Julia C.

doi: 10.1002/ejsp.70072pmid: N/A

Across three studies (N = 785) in the context of anti‐racist collective action in the United States and Germany, we empirically validate a theoretical framework of four motives for advantaged group allyship: outgroup‐focused, ingroup‐focused, personal and morality. We investigate the types of identification these motives stem from and how they contribute to collective action engagement on behalf of disadvantaged groups. In line with expectations, we show that outgroup‐focused and morality motives are predicted by politicized identification and linked to stronger commitment to collective action on behalf of the disadvantaged group, though only outgroup‐focused motive predicted more costly actions. On the other hand, ingroup‐focused motive was predicted by ingroup identification and personal motive by narcissism. Neither predicted future collective action intentions. This research provides empirical evidence that advantaged group allies participate in collective action out of very heterogeneous motives, not all of which contribute to sustained engagement.

Houdek, Petr; Bahník, Štěpán; Vranka, Marek; Zielina, Martin

doi: 10.1002/ejsp.70074pmid: N/A

When wrongdoing is committed by a powerful superior, victims face a strategic dilemma: punish (e.g., confront and report), avoid or forgive. Moral‐repair and restorative‐justice perspectives suggest that conciliatory responses can elicit guilt and restore cooperation, whereas punitive responses may deter misconduct but risk backlash, especially in situations of power asymmetry. Across four studies, we examined both sides of this dyadic process: how victims select response strategies and how powerful transgressors subsequently react. Study 1 (N = 1003) showed that observers expected more punishment for more severe supervisor transgressions, yet also anticipated that punished superiors would respond more unkindly than forgiven superiors. Two incentivized laboratory studies modelling asymmetric appropriation (Study 2a: N = 503; Study 2b: N = 487) replicated the severity–response gradient; however, the subsequent behaviour of powerful transgressors was largely unresponsive to either punishment or forgiveness. A retrospective incident survey of recent supervisor misconduct (Study 3; N = 395) revealed that avoidance was the most common response; higher perceived severity predicted punishment, and punishment was associated with greater supervisor retaliation and lower reconciliation. Across methods, we document an expectation–outcome gap as responses that are normatively endorsed and intuitively appealing often fail to induce moral repair when the transgressor is insulated by power.