Politics, schadenfreude, and ingroup identification: The sometimes happy thing about a poor economy and death |
| |
Authors: | David JY Combs Caitlin AJ Powell David Ryan Schurtz Richard H Smith |
| |
Institution: | Department of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40513, United States |
| |
Abstract: | Political campaigns are often characterized by the various events occurring that move the tide in favor of one candidate or another. Each event, depending on which candidate it favors or harms, produces either happiness or sadness for those who care about the outcome. This research examined whether such reactions would hold for events that are misfortunes for other people and even when they negatively affect society more broadly regardless of political party affiliation. Ingroup (i.e. political party) identification was examined as an important moderating variable. In four studies, undergraduate participants gave their emotional reactions to news articles describing misfortunes happening to others (e.g. poor economic news and house foreclosures). Party affiliation and the intensity of ingroup identification strongly predicted whether these events produced schadenfreude. |
| |
Keywords: | Schadenfreude Social emotions Social identity theory Intergroup emotion theory Political psychology |
本文献已被 ScienceDirect 等数据库收录! |
|