Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin

The relationship between beliefs about the causes of a policy-relevant issue (causal beliefs) and attitudes towards that policy (policy support) is complicated, with contradictory empirical results. The current research offers an explanation for this: causal beliefs only predict policy support when they are specific and correspond with the policy. We test this across six studies (N = 10,728; quota-representative samples of U.K. and US populations) within two policy domains (obesity and alcohol). In study 1, we test whether specific-corresponding beliefs are stronger correlates of policy support than other causal beliefs. In studies 2 and 4, we test whether communicating specific-corresponding causal evidence can increase policy support. In studies 3 and 4, we identify and confirm the psychological mechanism: perceived policy effectiveness. Study 5 involves a meta-analysis of the experimental studies. This provides support for our theory: specific-corresponding causal beliefs affect policy support, but general and non-corresponding causal beliefs do not.

As efforts to improve the credibility of psychological and other social sciences continue, researchers aim to conduct multi-study or multi-sample research and synthesize findings using different parameterizations of individual participant meta-analysis. No overarching organizational framework exists, and only a few simulation-based or empirical examples comparing these parameterizations. This article has two goals. First, we provide an overview of six common parameterizations of individual participant meta-analysis, organized into a taxonomy based on different features (e.g., sample-specific parameters, meta-analytic parameters, and number of models). Second, using empirical data from 26,205 participants across 11 longitudinal studies, we provide comparisons of each parameterization testing prospective associations between the personality traits and crystallized abilities. We found that openness was a robust predictor of crystallized abilities across samples. Across methods, we observed consistency in model estimates, with some exceptions. We conclude with recommendations for choosing an approach given a team’s goals, questions, data availability, and model features.

The spread of disinformation is widely regarded as one of the most serious global risks. In one laboratory and three online experiments (N_total = 3,066), we measured trust in true, false, and disinformation statements related to the Russo–Ukrainian war (Experiments 1–3) and to politics, climate, and health (Experiment 4). We examined longer-term effectiveness of a fact-based corrective message delivered either before (prebunking) or after (debunking) participants’ initial evaluation of disinformation statements. Across all four experiments, debunking intervention consistently and substantially reduced trust in disinformation, with effects persisting for at least two weeks. Prebunking intervention produced similarly durable benefits only when it was immediately followed by evaluation of the just-corrected disinformation. When evaluation was delayed, prebunking had no reliable impact. We found no significant backfire effects on trust in disinformation across any ideological groups. However, debunking induced a more conservative response pattern overall, reducing trust in true statements as well.

Research has identified a double-bind for female leaders: When acting in line with gender stereotypes, they are viewed as more likeable but less competent. Here, we test the impact of using gender stereotypical language—characterized by more prevention-focused language (e.g., avoiding risks) and less promotion-focused language (e.g., seeking gains)—on U.S. governors’ approval ratings during COVID-19 and their ability to promote effective social distancing behaviors. With a final dataset of 3,759 documents capturing governors’ communication, a 13-week panel of Google mobility data containing 6,534 observations (Study 1), U.S. nationally representative survey data from 57,532 participants (Study 2), and 24,247 tweets (Study 3), we find that female governors who use less prevention-focused, stereotypical language in their communications are more effective at increasing compliance with social distancing measures but receive lower approval ratings. As such, women leaders’ necessary approaches in crisis situations may undermine their sustainability in positions of power.

In diverse societies, minority groups may face challenges when events signal exclusion from a superordinate identity (SOI) shared with the relevant majority groups. We examine how such SOI threats relate to hardline political attitudes, focusing on betrayal as a potential mechanism. A cross-sectional study of Ethiopian Jews in Israel (N = 276) showed that priming an SOI threat was associated with support for violent resistance via betrayal. A two-wave study of Arab-Muslims in Israel (N = 165) showed that a real-time SOI-threatening event predicted betrayal and, in turn, increased support for violence, particularly among those with stronger baseline SOI. An additional two-wave study of Israeli Jewish women (N = 584) during the recent Gaza war extended this framework to a broader SOI shared with women worldwide: stronger baseline SOI predicted higher expectations of solidarity, which, when undermined by SOI threat, was associated with greater betrayal and hawkish wartime policy support.

Drawing on intergroup contact theory, this study examines whether intergroup anxiety and perceived discrimination mediate the relationship between intergroup contact and a dual sense of belonging: to mainstream society and to one’s ethnic ingroup. Data were collected through a paper-based survey of 513 Ethiopian Jews in Ethiopia (mean age = 24; the sample consisted primarily of single men with secondary education). Moderated mediation analyses indicate that intergroup contact is positively associated with belonging to mainstream society but unrelated to ingroup belonging. Intergroup anxiety shows a divergent pattern: higher anxiety is associated with lower belonging to mainstream society and stronger ingroup belonging. Contrary to expectations, intergroup contact is positively associated with perceived discrimination. Mediation analyses show that intergroup anxiety significantly mediates the relationship between contact and belonging, whereas perceived discrimination does not. These findings suggest that intergroup contact may foster integration but also heighten awareness of discrimination in stratified social contexts.

The United States is characterized as having relatively weak social norms compared to other countries. However, this characterization may be an oversimplification due to the cultural diversity that exists within the country. Four studies (N = 1,537) examined whether and why U.S. racial minorities (East Asian, Latinx, and African Americans) perceive their racial community’s norms to be significantly stronger than European Americans and White immigrants to the United States (Studies 1–4). This difference was not due to increased perceived discrimination (Study 3) or concerns about out-group member punishment (Study 4). Instead, racial minorities’ stronger perceptions of community norms were motivated primarily by interdependence (Studies 1–4) and concerns about being punished by in-group members for not following norms (Study 4). These findings illustrate differences in norm strength between racial groups in a single country, deepening our understanding of how social norm perceptions may vary in a multicultural society.

The experiential advantage refers to the well-being people derive from experiences over material goods. This research took a psychological needs approach and tested whether well-being predicts seeing purchases and products as being able to offer experiences. Five studies, using trait and state measures of well-being and sampling people in Asia and North America, supported this hypothesis. Controlled studies found that people higher in trait well-being viewed purchases as more experiential (Studies 1 and 5). Momentary well-being, whether measured or manipulated, showed a similarly positive impact of higher well-being on experiential perceptions (Studies 2–4). The effect was specific to perceptions of the experiential nature of products, not their materiality, and was most consistent for the positive affect component of well-being. Combined with prior findings, results suggest a self-reinforcing, benevolent cycle: experiences improve well-being, and well-being orients people to the experiential, need-satisfying aspects of products, which may then further support well-being.

Conspiracy theorists often prompt others to “Do your own research.” Could a general desire for such epistemic autonomy—to make up one’s own mind rather than deferring to others’ testimony—explain why some people are attracted to conspiracy theories? In four pre-registered studies (United States and United Kingdom, N = 1196), we test whether participants more likely to believe in conspiracy theories have a stronger preference for forming their own beliefs independently. Participants chose between doing a difficult perceptual task themselves or relying on an expert’s answer. Internal fixed-effect meta-analyses revealed a weak but statistically significant relationship between belief in conspiracy theories and preference for first-hand evidence. By contrast, the relationship between epistemic individualism and this preference was stronger and more robust. This suggests that, although individuals endorsing conspiracy theories express a stronger preference for “doing their own research,” their behavior mostly does not match this preference in non-conspiratorial contexts.

People who perceive they lack power inhibit their needs and goals, sometimes aggress to restore power, and experience poorer well-being. However, people may underestimate how much power they have to meet their needs. Guided by error management principles, we tested whether people systematically underestimate their power in relationships. Across four samples of friendships, same-gender couples, and woman–man couples (N = 1,304 dyads), we used Truth and Bias models to assess discrepancies between people’s own perceived power and the power they had as reported by their friends/partners. We found robust evidence that people underestimated their power. Moreover, higher self-protection motives (e.g., attachment anxiety) and specific power motives (e.g., desire for power) predicted greater underestimation bias whereas higher pro-relationship motives (commitment) predicted lower underestimation bias. These results illustrate that self-protection, pro-relationship, and power motives bias perceptions of power, advancing our understanding of why and how these predictors shape power-related behaviors and relationship outcomes.

Past research on collective action focuses on how identification with a marginalized group or with a politicized identity motivates collective action. We propose that egalitarian ideology—a preference for group-based equality and opposition to hierarchy—can help explain why both marginalized and dominant group members can be motivated to engage in system-challenging collective action. In Studies 1A–1C, among Black, Asian, and White Americans, egalitarianism was related to supporting collective action to advocate for racial equality. In Study 2, the egalitarianism–collective action relationship persisted among White participants when it was salient that their group would lose advantages from reducing racial inequality, and even among those relatively higher in White identification. Thus, egalitarianism helps explain why individuals engage in system-challenging collective action, regardless of whether their racial group benefits, and even when their racial group stands to lose.

Across three experimental studies using hypothetical scenarios, we investigated under what circumstances, and to what effect, women and men devalue women’s orgasm. In Studies 1 and 2, women reported their orgasm value in response to a hypothetical scenario that varied their imagined orgasm history and current orgasm frequency with a new partner (low vs. high). In Study 2, orgasm value was compared to a baseline, pre-manipulation measure of orgasm value. In both studies, we found that women devalued orgasm only when they imagined they had a history of infrequent orgasms and were not orgasming with their current partner. When current orgasm frequency was low, women who valued orgasm less (or devalued orgasm) imagined better sexual and relationship outcomes than women who valued orgasm more. Men (Study 3) valued a hypothetical female partner’s orgasm less under the same circumstances and reported similar impacts of women’s orgasm absence on their own and perceived partner’s imagined sexual and relationship outcomes.

Prior research established positive ties between intimate partners’ self-esteem (SE) and support interactions, but evidence on whether intraindividual changes in SE and supportive dyadic coping are associated over time remains scarce. The present study tested prominent theories suggesting a reciprocal prospective relationship between SE, one’s own and partner’s supportive dyadic coping using 14 waves of nationally representative data totaling 13,683 young adults from Germany. We used random intercept cross-lagged panel models for data analysis. Our findings revealed significant reciprocal within-person transactions between SE, one’s own and partner’s dyadic coping over time. We conclude that high SE may boost positive support interactions in intimate relationships. At the same time, giving and receiving positive support in times of stress may strengthen intimate partners’ SE on the long run. Overall, our findings provide robust evidence that people’s support interactions and SE development go hand in hand within the context of intimate partner relationships.

In the past two decades, research on the motivational underpinnings of the Dark Triad has burgeoned. However, it is unclear how each Dark Triad trait may map onto the values circumplex, and whether the research conducted thus far indicates consistent effects. In this multi-level meta-analysis, we examined the relationship between Dark Triad personality traits and personal values. Across 34 studies conducted between 2000 and 2020, Dark Triad traits were positively associated with self-enhancement and openness-to-change value dimensions, and negatively associated with self-transcendence and conservation value dimensions. Shape consistency for the Dark Triad associations was stronger for the self-enhancement versus self-transcendence values tension than for the openness-to-change versus conservation values tension. We concluded that Dark Triad traits showed meaningful patterns of associations with personal values with some differences between the traits. Materials, data, and code are available on: https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/4Z27F

Animosity toward immigrants, especially those who are undocumented, has reached high levels in many parts of the United States. What can be done to counteract anti-immigrant hostility? One solution is to implement media interventions, which are uniquely positioned to reduce animosity. We thus conducted two studies to assess the efficacy of three media interventions to reduce anti-immigrant attitudes. In Study 1 (N = 2,050), we conducted an intervention tournament and found that one video was particularly effective at reducing anti-immigrant hostility and support for anti-immigrant policies, especially among Republicans. This video shared the story of undocumented immigrants who served in the U.S. military but were subsequently deported due to their legal status. In Study 2 (N = 3,000), we replicated these findings among nationally representative partisan voters. These results suggest that a simple media intervention has the power to improve attitudes toward undocumented immigrants across the political spectrum.

People complain that they do not know what to say to soften the blow of social rejection. The adoption of language principles (i.e., avoiding apologies while using positive regard, sincere alternatives, and more words) may mitigate the negative consequences of social rejection. Does training help people independently exhibit greater communication skill or do people fail to perform despite “knowing better?” In Study 1, drift diffusion modeling suggested that training helped people “know it when they see it” (i.e., recognize precrafted wording options which better conveyed the language principles). Study 2 found that training aided people’s success in independently crafting wording to convey the language principles. The current research highlights that existing social rejector frameworks and previous research on skill acquisition do not capture the experience of nonpunitive rejectors and presents a way that psychological science can address people’s concerns about how to soften the blow of social rejection.

We live in an increasingly interconnected world where people’s influence spreads through social networks and media with unprecedented speed. Yet, our knowledge about how people attribute blame in causal chains of spreading human actions is limited. We propose that people trace the causal origin in a sequence of interconnected human actions and blame the initiator of the causal chain for the negative consequences at its end. Four experiments (N = 1,777) show that people trace causal origin in action sequences to the second degree of separation and regard this causal inference as the basis of blame attribution. People also take into account the multiplying effect of junctions in action sequences and attribute more blame to initiators of causal chains when the cascading effects lead to more severe consequences. The findings support the social functionalist approach to naïve blame attribution in human causal chains.

Fostering prosociality in adolescents is essential for social cohesion and well-being, yet the psychological processes underlying individual differences remain understudied. Guided by moral identity theory, this research examined how moral identity internalization and symbolization relate to prosociality and whether moral elevation mediates these associations. Across three studies, moral identity internalization showed a stronger and more consistent association with prosociality than symbolization. Study 1, using cross-sectional data, found that both moral identity internalization and symbolization were related to prosociality through moral elevation. Study 2 utilized a mediation pathway analysis and found that moral identity internalization was positively associated with moral elevation and prosociality, and that moral elevation was further associated with prosociality. Study 3 employed a measurement-of-mediation design, providing additional evidence that moral elevation mediates the link between moral identity internalization and prosociality. These findings suggest that moral elevation is a key mechanism linking moral identity to prosociality and that interventions fostering moral elevation may support adolescents’ prosocial development.