1
|
Sassenrath C, Keller J, Stöckle D, Kesberg R, Nielsen YA, Pfattheicher S. I like it because it hurts you: On the association of everyday sadism, sadistic pleasure, and victim blaming. J Pers Soc Psychol 2024; 126:105-127. [PMID: 37079847 DOI: 10.1037/pspp0000464] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 04/22/2023]
Abstract
Past research on determinants of victim blaming mainly concentrated on individuals' just-world beliefs as motivational process underlying this harsh reaction to others' suffering. The present work provides novel insights regarding underlying affective processes by showing how individuals prone to derive pleasure from others' suffering-individuals high in everyday sadism-engage in victim blaming due to increased sadistic pleasure and reduced empathic concern they experience. Results of three cross-sectional studies and one ambulatory assessment study applying online experience sampling method (ESM; overall N = 2,653) document this association. Importantly, the relation emerged over and above the honesty-humility, emotionality, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness personality model (Study 1a), and other so-called dark traits (Study 1b), across different cultural backgrounds (Study 1c), and also when sampling from a population of individuals frequently confronted with victim-perpetrator constellations: police officers (Study 1d). Studies 2 and 3 highlight a significant behavioral correlate of victim blaming. Everyday sadism is related to reduced willingness to engage in effortful cognitive activity as individuals high (vs. low) in everyday sadism recall less information regarding victim-perpetrator constellations of sexual assault. Results obtained in the ESM study (Study 4) indicate that the relation of everyday sadism, sadistic pleasure, and victim blaming holds in everyday life and is not significantly moderated by interpersonal closeness to the blamed victim or impactfulness of the incident. Overall, the present article extends our understanding of what determines innocent victims' derogation and highlights emotional mechanisms, societal relevance, and generalizability of the observed associations beyond the laboratory. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Claudia Sassenrath
- Department of Social Psychology, Institute of Psychology and Education, Ulm University
| | - Johannes Keller
- Department of Social Psychology, Institute of Psychology and Education, Ulm University
| | - Dominik Stöckle
- Department of Social Psychology, Institute of Psychology and Education, Ulm University
| | | | | | | |
Collapse
|
2
|
Turner-Zwinkels FM, van Noord J, Kesberg R, García-Sánchez E, Brandt MJ, Kuppens T, Easterbrook MJ, Smets L, Gorska P, Marchlewska M, Turner-Zwinkels T. Affective Polarization and Political Belief Systems: The Role of Political Identity and the Content and Structure of Political Beliefs. Pers Soc Psychol Bull 2023:1461672231183935. [PMID: 37475668 DOI: 10.1177/01461672231183935] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 07/22/2023]
Abstract
We investigate the extent that political identity, political belief content (i.e., attitude stances), and political belief system structure (i.e., relations among attitudes) differences are associated with affective polarization (i.e., viewing ingroup partisans positively and outgroup partisans negatively) in two multinational, cross-sectional studies (Study 1 N = 4,152, Study 2 N = 29,994). First, we found a large, positive association between political identity and group liking-participants liked their ingroup substantially more than their outgroup. Second, political belief system content and structure had opposite associations with group liking: Sharing similar belief system content with an outgroup was associated with more outgroup liking, but similarity with the ingroup was associated with less ingroup liking. The opposite pattern was found for political belief system structure. Thus, affective polarization was greatest when belief system content similarity was low and structure similarity was high.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | - Paulina Gorska
- Institute of Psychology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
| | | | | |
Collapse
|
3
|
Abstract
Abstract. We investigated whether individuals’ punishment behavior aims at compensating for inflicted harm (i.e., retribution) or at deterring the offender from committing the offense again (i.e., deterrence) and whether punishment motives depend on the punishment system. Participants ( N = 149) assigned punishment for selfish decisions in a group resource allocation task under three conditions: Open punishment (the allocator is informed about the punishment, allowing for retribution and deterrence); hidden punishment (the allocator is not informed about the punishment, precluding deterrence); and unintentional offense (decision is made by the computer not the allocator, precluding retribution and deterrence). In line with retribution motives, participants assigned more punishment under hidden punishment compared to unintentional offense and open punishment. We found these differences in punishment between punishment conditions only under centralized punishment (i.e., punishment can only be executed by one group member), but not under decentralized punishment (i.e., each group member can punish).
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Laila Nockur
- Department of Psychology and Behavioural Sciences, Aarhus University, Denmark
| | | | - Stefan Pfattheicher
- Department of Psychology and Behavioural Sciences, Aarhus University, Denmark
| | | |
Collapse
|
4
|
Kesberg R, Keller J. Personal values as motivational basis of psychological essentialism: An exploration of the value profile underlying essentialist beliefs. Personality and Individual Differences 2021. [DOI: 10.1016/j.paid.2020.110458] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
|
5
|
Kesberg R, Keller J. Donating to the ‘right’ cause: Compatibility of personal values and mission statements of philanthropic organizations fosters prosocial behavior. Personality and Individual Differences 2021. [DOI: 10.1016/j.paid.2020.110313] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
|
6
|
Singh P, Tewari S, Kesberg R, Karl JA, Bulbulia J, Fischer R. Time investments in rituals are associated with social bonding, affect and subjective health: a longitudinal study of Diwali in two Indian communities. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2020; 375:20190430. [PMID: 32594880 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2019.0430] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Rituals are performed within specific socio-ecological niches, yet the different effects of the same ritual form across different niches (community contexts) remains unclear. Here, using longitudinal measures over a two-week period during Diwali (the Indian festival of light), we investigate the relationship between ritual time allocation and social cohesion in two Indian communities. First, the positive effects of ritual on social bonding, perceived health and affect were highest on the focal day of the festival. Second, we observed anticipatory effects of ritualistic commitment on affect prior to the main day of the festival. Third, social bonding patterns were similar in the two Indian settings, indicating that Diwali fosters social cohesion across diverse social ecologies (cultural niches). However, individually focused emotional benefits appear to dampened in more cosmopolitan environments. Finally, time investments reveal diminishing marginal utilities for ritual activities on social cognition. Ritual time investments were linked to greater affect and family cohesion up to a certain limit. We argue that attention to the diminishing returns of ritual time investments on social cohesion across diverse human ecologies is an important horizon for future cross-cultural investigations. This article is part of the theme issue 'Ritual renaissance: new insights into the most human of behaviours'.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Purnima Singh
- Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, New Delhi 110016, India
| | - Shruti Tewari
- Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Management, Indore, India
| | - Rebekka Kesberg
- Fakultät für Ingenieurswissenschaften, Informatik und Psychologie, Abteilung Sozialpsychologie, Universität Ulm, Ulm, Germany
| | - Johannes Alfons Karl
- School of Psychology, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand
| | - Joseph Bulbulia
- School of Humanities, Faculty of Arts, Auckland University, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Ronald Fischer
- School of Psychology, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand.,Institute D'Or de Pesquisa e Ensino, Sao Paulo, Brazil
| |
Collapse
|
7
|
Kesberg R, Keller J. The Relation Between Human Values and Perceived Situation Characteristics in Everyday Life. Front Psychol 2018; 9:1676. [PMID: 30271362 PMCID: PMC6146720 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01676] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/21/2018] [Accepted: 08/20/2018] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Values refer to abstract beliefs which serve as guidelines in peoples' life and affect the way people and events are evaluated. Simultaneously, unlike attitudes, values transcend specific actions, and situations. While recent research showed that values are related to the attention and interpretation of situational information in standardized laboratory settings, up to date hardly any empirical work investigated how values relate to situation perception in daily life. In our study, we assessed the relation between the endorsement of human values and situation characteristics (i.e., the 8 DIAMONDS). Using the Day Reconstruction Method in two samples (German and US-American), we found that especially variance in the experience of negatively connoted situation characteristics were due to individual differences. Power was related to experiencing more deceptive situations, while the reversed pattern emerged for universalism and benevolence. Tradition was related to experiencing more aversive situations while self-direction was related to experiencing less situations high in adversity. Although, our results might provide some initial evidence for a relation between personal values and subjective situations experiences in everyday life, no clear pattern emerged and further investigation of the relation is necessary.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Rebekka Kesberg
- Department of Social Psychology, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany
| | - Johannes Keller
- Department of Social Psychology, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany
| |
Collapse
|
8
|
Affiliation(s)
| | - Robert Böhm
- School of Business and Economics; RWTH Aachen University; Germany
| | | |
Collapse
|