Ideological passion and violent activism: The moderating role of the significance quest

This research examines how the relationship between passion for an ideology and violent activism is magnified by the personal (vs. collective) loss of significance. In Study 1 (N = 238), the relationship between obsessive (but not harmonious) passion for the Republican Party and violent activism was moderated by personal (but not collective) loss of significance. Study 2 (N = 612) replicated these findings with an experimental manipulation of personal and collective loss of significance in a sample of Black Lives Matter supporters. In Study 3 (N = 416), we set out to attenuate the obsessive passion-violent activism relationship by experimentally manipulating personal and collective significance gain. Echoing the results of Studies 1 and 2, the manipulation of personal (but not collective) significance gain reduced the relationship between obsessive passion for the environmental cause and violent activism. Furthermore, Study 3 examined the psychological mechanism at play by incorporating a measure of goal-shielding - a factor of theoretical relevance to explain extreme behaviour. Personal significance gain reduced individuals' proclivity to inhibit goals unrelated to their ideological pursuit, which in turn reduced their support for violent activism. These findings reveal psychological factors relevant to detecting at-risk individuals and implementing cost-effective prevention programmes against ideological violence.

The Role of Self-Awareness and Problem-Solving Orientation for the Instrumentality of Goal-Related Means

Abstract. Successful goal striving hinges on the selection of instrumental means. The current research investigates individual differences in self-awareness as a predictor for means instrumentality. This effect should be mediated by the tendency of self-aware individuals to approach the process of goal pursuit in a way that is problem-solving-oriented. Four studies ( N1a = 123, N1b = 169, N2 = 353, N3 = 118) were conducted to explore the positive relation between self-awareness and means instrumentality via heightened levels of problem-solving orientation. Studies 1a and 1b found cross-sectional support for the relation between dispositional self-awareness and problem-solving orientation. Study 2 (preregistered) replicated this finding and provided experimental evidence for the hypothesized mediation model. Finally, Study 3 found longitudinal support that dispositional self-awareness and problem-solving orientation predict self-reported means instrumentality and, beyond this, participants’ objective exam grades. This research emphasizes the crucial role of individual differences in self-awareness for an important self-regulatory process, that is, the selection of instrumental means in personal goal pursuit.

The sociocognitive processes of ideological obsession: review and policy implications

Understanding what motivates people to join violent ideological groups and engage in acts of cruelty against others is of great social and societal importance. In this paper, I posit that one necessary element is ‘ideological obsession’—an ideological commitment fuelled by unmet psychological needs and regulated by inhibitory and ego-defensive mechanisms. Drawing from evidence collected across cultures and ideologies, I describe four processes through which ideological obsession puts individuals on a path towards violence. First, ideological obsession deactivates moral self-regulatory processes, allowing unethical behaviours to be carried out without self-recrimination. Second, ideologically obsessed individuals are easily threatened by information that criticises their ideology, which in turn leads to hatred and violent retaliation. Third, ideological obsession changes people's social interactions by making them gravitate towards like-minded individuals who support ideological violence. As these social networks become more interconnected, they amplify one's adherence to violent extremism. Finally, ideologically obsessed individuals are prone to psychological reactance, making them immune to communication strategies intended to dissuade them from using violence. In fact, messages espousing non-violence can have the opposite effect by reinforcing their violence-supporting ideology. I conclude by presenting evidence-based strategies to prevent radicalisation leading to violence for individuals in pre-criminal spaces.

This article is part of the theme issue ‘The political brain: neurocognitive and computational mechanisms’.

Propelling pride to promote healthy food choices among entity and incremental theorists

Past research suggests that people's beliefs about the malleability of their body weight influence their motivation to engage in healthful behaviors: people who perceive their body weight as fixed (entity theorists) engage less in healthful behaviors than people who perceive their body weight as changeable (incremental theorists). Accordingly, current health interventions frequently aim at shifting entity theorists' beliefs about the malleability of their body weight. Instead of trying to change these beliefs, we test whether the elicitation of pride from past achievements can serve as an intervention to promote healthful behaviors among entity theorists. In addition, we contrast the effect of pride recall among entity theorists with the effect among incremental theorists. Specifically, we find that entity theorists chose healthier behaviors upon the recall of pride related and unrelated to the health domain - the source of pride does not seem to matter. For incremental theorists, however, the source of pride does matter. While health-related pride led them to persist in making healthy food choices, health-unrelated pride instilled reward-seeking behavior among incremental theorists. Prompting health-related pride might be a viable motivational tool to promote healthy food choices, as it is beneficial for entity theorists without thwarting the motivation of incremental theorists.

Helping when the desire is low: Expectancy as a booster

One might assume that the desire to help (here described as Want) is the essential driver of helping declarations and/or behaviors. However, even if desire to help (Want) is low, intention to help may still occur if the expectancy regarding the perceived effectiveness of helping is high. We tested these predictions in a set of three experimental studies. In all three, we measured the desire to help (Want) and the Expectancy that the aid would be impactful for the victim; in addition, we manipulated Expectancy in Study 3. In Studies 1 and 3, we measured the participants’ declaration to help while in Study 2, their helping behavior was examined. In all three studies, we used variations of the same story about a victim. The results supported our hypothesis. Thus, the studies help to tease apart the determinants of helping under conditions of lowered desire to do so, an issue of great importance in public policymaking.

How passionate individuals regulate their activity with other life domains: A goal-systemic perspective

OBJECTIVE

People that pursue a passionate activity obsessively (vs. harmoniously) tend to neglect (vs. integrate) other important life domains, yet research has been silent on the psychological mechanism explaining these differences in self-regulation. The purpose of this research was to address this gap by testing the role of alternative goal suppression.

METHOD

Four studies tested whether harmonious passion is characterized by the pursuit of multifinality, the preference for means that gratify multiple goals simultaneously, whereas obsessive passion is characterized by the pursuit of counterfinality, the preference for means that serves a focal goal to the detriment of other pursuits. Underlying this relationship is the tendency to suppress goals conflicting with one's passion.

RESULTS

Study 1 found cross-sectional support for these hypotheses. Study 2 replicated Study 1 and extended it by demonstrating that the relationship between obsessive passion and counterfinal means is mediated by alternative goal suppression. Study 3 replicated these findings using an experimental manipulation of passion. Study 4 found similar results by experimentally manipulating alternative goal suppression, the mediator, to demonstrate its causal influence on means evaluation.

CONCLUSIONS

Collectively, the present results demonstrate that passion plays a significant role in the type of means-ends relations preferred for goal pursuits.

How Focusing on Superordinate Goals Motivates Broad, Long-Term Goal Pursuit: A Theoretical Perspective

Goal-setting theory states that challenging, specific, and concrete goals (i.e., subordinate goals) are powerful motivators and boost performance in goal pursuit more than vague or abstract goals (i.e., superordinate goals). Goal-setting theory predominantly focuses on single, short-term goals and less on broad, long-term challenges. This review article extends goal-setting theory and argues that superordinate goals also fulfill a crucial role in motivating behavior, particularly when addressing broad, long-term challenges. The purpose of this article is to shed light on the benefits of superordinate goals, which have received less attention in research, and to show theoretically that people pursue long-term goals more successfully when they focus on subordinate as well as superordinate goals than when they focus on either subordinate or superordinate goals alone.

Counterfinality: On the Increased Perceived Instrumentality of Means to a Goal

The present research investigates the counterfinality effect, whereby the more a means is perceived as detrimental to an alternative goal, the more it is perceived as instrumental to its focal goal. The results from five studies supported this hypothesis. Study 1 demonstrated the counterfinality effect in an applied context: The more pain people experienced when getting tattooed, the more they perceived getting tattooed as instrumental to attaining their idiosyncratic goals (being unique, showing off, etc.). Study 2 experimentally replicated and extended the results of Study 1: A counterfinal (vs. non-counterfinal) consumer product was perceived as more detrimental, which in turn predicted the perceived effectiveness of the product. In Studies 3 and 5, we showed that increased perceived instrumentality due to counterfinality led to more positive attitudes toward a means. Finally, Studies 4 and 5 indicated that simultaneous commitment to both the focal and the alternative goal moderated the counterfinality effect. We discuss how various psychological phenomena can be subsumed under the general framework of counterfinality, which has broad practical implications extending to consumer behavior, health psychology, and terrorism.