Understanding sexual prejudice: The role of political ideology and strategic essentialism

Despite the increased visibility and acceptance of the LGBTQ community, sexual minorities continue to face prejudice and discrimination in many domains. Past research has shown that this prejudice is more prevalent among those holding conservative political views. In two studies, we merge strategic essentialism and motivated ideology theoretical perspectives to empirically investigate the link between political orientation and sexual prejudice. More specifically, we examine how conservatives strategically use different forms of essentialism to support their views of gay individuals and their reactions to messages aimed at changing essentializing beliefs. In Study 1 (N = 220), we demonstrate that conservatives endorse social essentialism (i.e., the belief that gay and straight people are fundamentally different from each other) more than liberals do. In turn, they blame gay individuals more for their sexual orientation and show more prejudice toward them. At the same time, conservatives endorse trait essentialism (i.e., the belief that sexual orientation is a fixed attribute that cannot be changed) less than liberals do, which in turn predicts greater levels of blame and prejudice for conservatives relative to liberals. In Study 2 (N = 217), we additionally show that conservatives, but not liberals, are resistant to messages aimed at increasing trait essentialism and reducing prejudice toward sexual minorities. We discuss theoretical and practical implications of these findings.     

Getting connected: Intergroup contact on Facebook

One correlational study examined whether virtual contact via Facebook is positively related to intergroup relations. The followers of two online campaigns from Iran and Israel—whose countries have been in a politically hostile relationship since the 1980s—indicated the amount of direct and indirect virtual (Facebook) and real-life outgroup contact they have had, a number of quality and affective judgments about that contact, and completed an affective prejudice measure about the respective outgroup. Overall, contact was negatively associated with affective prejudice, providing support for the contact hypothesis in a specific and exclusively virtual setting with citizens of hostile nations. Previously experienced real-life contact did not moderate the results, suggesting that virtual contact has an independent link to positive outgroup attitudes.     

Racial microaffirmations as a response to racial microaggressions: Exploring risk and protective factors

The urgency of the Black Lives Matter movement, and societal inequities emerging amid the COVID-19 pandemic call researchers to better understand the implications of racism in the lives of People of Color. In this paper, we utilize Critical Race Theory (CRT) to extend theorizing on the concept of racial microaffirmations as a response to everyday systemic racism—racial microaggressions. We reframe the psychological concept of risk and protective factors to illustrate the relationship between racial microaggressions and microaffirmations. Our findings identify types of racial microaffirmations experienced by Students of Color at a public four-year institution in California. We explore how these microaffirmations are experienced and the effects they have on the students well-being.     

Positive and negative intergroup contact: Interaction not asymmetry

This research reports a novel investigation into the comparative effects of positive and negative direct and extended intergroup contact on intergroup orientations. It tested the generality of the positive–negative asymmetry effect among majority (N = 357) and minority (N = 101) group members in Iceland. Little evidence of asymmetry was observed: the beneficial effects of positive contact were mostly as strong as the detrimental effects of negative contact, for both direct and extended contact. However, evidence was found for alternative interaction models in which positive contact buffers the negative effects of negative contact, and negative contact enhances the benefits of positive contact. These interaction effects were found only for direct contact and principally in the majority group, but were also found for the minority group, though more weakly. No interaction was observed for extended contact. It appeared that differential group salience elicited by positive and negative contact could partly contribute to the explanation of the observed effects, at least in the majority sample.     

Complicating marginalisation: the case of Mormon and nonreligious college students in a predominantly Mormon context

There is now compelling evidence that both nonreligious individuals and members of minority religions report feeling marginalised in the United States. However, to date, no one has explored whether a shift from minority status to majority status influences perceptions of marginalisation. In this paper, we explore whether Mormons, members of a minority religion in the USA who perceive marginalisation nationally, contribute to the marginalisation of other minority religious/nonreligious groups when they are the numerical majority. Using data from a survey fielded at a predominantly Mormon university in a predominantly Mormon community in the American West, our data suggest that nonreligious students in a predominantly Mormon context report significantly higher levels of perceived marginalisation. Our findings illustrate that minority status is an important determinant of perceived marginalisation and that numerical minority or majority status should be taken into consideration when examining perceptions of marginalisation.     

Fighting ageism through nostalgia

Two experiments tested whether nostalgia is a resource for fighting ageism. In Experiment 1, younger adults who recalled a nostalgic (vs. ordinary) encounter with an older adult showed a more positive attitude towards older adults, mediated by greater inclusion of older adults in the self (IOGS). In Experiment 2, these findings were replicated and extended with a subtle nostalgia manipulation. Younger adults identified an older, familiar adult, before writing about an encounter with this person that was characterized by either central (e.g., keepsakes and childhood) or peripheral (e.g., wishing and daydreaming) features of the construct of nostalgia (i.e., prototype). Participants who recalled a central (vs. peripheral) nostalgic encounter reported greater social connectedness, which predicted increased IOGS. In turn, increased IOGS was associated with a lower desire to avoid older adults. Several alternative explanations for the intergroup benefits of nostalgia were ruled out. The research established that nostalgia qualifies as a resource for combatting ageism.     

Will we be harmed,will it be severe,can we protect ourselves? Threat appraisals predict collective angst (and its consequences)

Across four studies, we applied the cognitive model of anxiety to explicate the appraisals that elicit collective angst (i.e., concern for the in‐group's future vitality). In Study 1a, consistent with the model, Québécois experienced collective angst when they appraised the following: (1) a threat as likely to harm their group, (2) a threat as severely harming their group, and (3) Québécois as not having efficacy to protect their group. In Study 1b, results were replicated in the context of the realistic threat that Islamic extremists pose to Christian‐Lebanese. In Studies 2a and 2b, we manipulated the three appraisals and found a similar pattern of results in the context of a potential terrorist attack on American soil by Islamic extremists. Importantly, collective angst mediated the threat appraisal effect on (non‐Muslim) Americans' prejudice towards Muslims. The utility of the appraisal model for regulating collective angst (and thus its consequences) is discussed.     

Articles of Faith: Freedom of Expression and Religious Freedom in Contemporary Multiculture

ABSTRACT

This article examines the relationship between freedom of religion and freedom of speech and expression within contemporary multicultural liberal democracies. These two fundamental human rights have increasingly been seen, in public and political discourse, in terms of tension if not outright opposition, a view reinforced by the Charlie Hebdo killings in January 2015. And yet in every human rights charter they are proximate to one another. This essay argues that this adjacency is not coincidental, that it has a history and that, in illuminating this history, it is possible to explore how the contemporary framing of these two rights as being in opposition has come about. Looking back to the framing of the First Amendment of the US Constitution, the essay offers an historical perspective that, in turn, facilitates a reappraisal and re-evaluation of these two liberties that is the necessary, albeit insufficient, predicate to the task of addressing the problematic of multicultural ‘crisis' in the contemporary liberal democracies of Western Europe, North America and Australasia, in which the presence of certain religious communities (Muslims, in particular) and the role of religion in public and political life more generally (and, conversely, of secularism) has assumed a central importance.     

Heterosexual Identity Management: How Social Context Affects Heterosexual Marking Practices

It is well established that heterosexism shapes identity management practices of sexual minorities in the United States, but we know little about how such social forces shape heterosexual identity management. This exploratory research is focused on heterosexual marking, defined as behaviors interpreted as signifying a heterosexual identity. Using data from 12 focus groups with young adults, we provide an overview of heterosexual marking in a northeastern United States context and explain how three social forces—cultural assumptions of heterosexuality, sexual orientation ambiguity and suspicion, and heterosexism—are intertwined with these identity practices. Results indicated that this social context generates heterosexual marking that is sometimes intentional and conscious but at other times unintentional and unconscious, depending on levels of heteronormativity and heterosexism.     

The vicious circle of religious prejudice: Islamophobia makes the acculturation attitudes of majority and minority members clash

Public discourse often portrays Islam as the main obstacle for Muslim minorities' integration, paying little attention to the contextual factors hindering this process. Here, we focus on islamophobia as one destructive factor that hinders the mutual integration between Muslim minority and Western majority members, affecting both groups. In Study 1, the more islamophobic majority members were, the more they expected Muslims to give up their heritage culture and the less they wanted them to integrate. In Study 2, only when Muslims experienced substantial religious discrimination did religious identity negatively relate to national engagement and particularly positively relate to ethnic engagement. Together, the studies suggest that religious prejudice in the form of islamophobia is a major obstacle to Muslims' integration because it increases the incongruity between majority and minority members' acculturation attitudes.