The role of threat,emotions, and prejudice in promoting collective action against immigrant groups

In two studies we assessed the role of distinctiveness threat, group‐based emotions (angst, fear, and anger), and prejudice on people's willingness to engage in collective action against immigrant groups. In Study 1 (N = 222) White British participants were either informed that in the next 40 years the proportion of immigrants in the UK is unlikely to change (control condition) or that there will be more immigrants than White British people living in Britain (threat condition). We obtained support for a sequential multiple mediator model in which threat predicted British people's willingness to engage in collective action via the emotions first and then prejudice. This finding was replicated in Study 2 with an Italian sample (N = 283). These results enhance understanding of when and why advantaged groups undertake collective action against disadvantaged groups by demonstrating that distinctiveness threats and emotions promote such actions.     

Introducing Reality Play Therapy: Reactions and Perceptions From Elementary School Counselors

Many elementary school students lack school relationships required for positive personal, social, and academic interactions. Reality therapy and play therapy both seek to address these relationships through developmentally appropriate and effective interventions. Integrating these 2 approaches has the potential for elementary school counselors to provide students with opportunities to create positive relationships and develop problem-solving skills. In this study, 8 school counselors participated in a series of trainings introducing reality play-therapy techniques to assess this potential. A thematic analysis conducted on feedback sessions following the trainings yielded themes related to the participants’ positive perceptions to the training and possible application.     

Assessing Stimulus Control in a Discrimination Task with Compound Stimuli: Evaluating Testing Procedures and Tracking Eye Fixations

The Psychological Record - Experiments with pigeons have suggested that the way stimuli are arranged in tests affects the demonstration of the stimulus control established during training. The...     

French Validation of the Overexcitability Questionnaire 2: Psychometric Properties and Factorial Structure

Overexcitability corresponds to an overall response to stimulations in 5 domains: psychomotor, sensual, intellectual, imaginational, and emotional. The aim of this study was to develop a French version of the Overexcitability Questionnaire 2 (OEQ2) and to expand its psychometric properties. Two studies were conducted: one with a sample of 474 adolescents and another with a sample of 436 adults. Internal consistency, factorial structure, and validity (correlations with intelligence, personality, and alexithymia) were examined. The French OEQ2 showed satisfactory psychometric properties, thus advocating for its use in further research on overexcitability and in clinical practice.     

In the name of democracy: The value of democracy explains leniency towards wrongdoings as a function of group political organization

According to the “democracy‐as‐value” hypothesis, democracy has become an ideological belief system providing social value to democratic individuals, groups and institutions, granting legitimacy to their actions (even if dishonest or violent), and protecting them from consecutive punishments. The present research investigates the extent to which this legitimizing process is based on the individual endorsement of democratic principles. Across four experiments, following the misdeed of a (few) group member(s), respondents who valued democratic group organization and democracy in general expressed more lenient retributive justice judgments towards democratic (as compared with nondemocratic) offender groups. These findings shed light on the ways in which democratic ideology infuses justice judgments. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

FEMALE SEXUALITY,NATIONALISM AND LARGE GROUP IDENTITY

Nationalist movements are emerging today everywhere in the world. Many of them display a high level of aggression and a negative attitude toward sexuality and especially female sexuality. Along with this, erotic fiction with a sadomasochistic orientation has achieved great success and has hundreds of millions of readers in the world. This collective fantasy allows some integration of aggression in sexual life while questioning liberal morality and its equality in gender roles and conservative morality and its idea of control over passion. Both phenomena may represent different responses to the appearance of a new female sexuality threatening the social structure we know.     

Emergent Power Hierarchies and Group Performance

In newly formed groups, informal hierarchies emerge automatically and readily. In this study, we argue that emergent group hierarchies enhance group performance (Hypothesis 1) and we assume that the more the power hierarchy within a group corresponds to the task‐competence differences of the individual group members, the better the group performs (Hypothesis 2). Twelve three‐person groups and 28 four‐person groups were investigated while solving the Winter Survival Task. Results show that emerging power hierarchies positively impact group performance but the alignment between task‐competence and power hierarchy did not affect group performance. Thus, emergent power hierarchies are beneficial for group performance and although they were on average created around individual group members' competence, this correspondence was not a prerequisite for better group performance.     

Antiegalitarians for affirmative action? When social dominance orientation is positively related to support for egalitarian social policies

Previous research has found that people high in social dominance orientation (i.e., antiegalitarians) generally oppose affirmative action policies. We propose that antiegalitarians may be less opposed to strong affirmative action policies because such policies may be perceived to ultimately strengthen racial hierarchies. Studies 1 and 2 demonstrate that antiegalitarian individuals are less opposed to affirmative action policies, as compared to egalitarian individuals, when such policies strongly weigh minority status in selection decisions. Study 3 provides evidence that antiegalitarians lessen their opposition to strong policies only when such policies are believed to enhance racial hierarchies through the recruitment of minorities that remain at the bottom of organizational hierarchies. Theoretical, political, and organizational implications are discussed.