Prosocial behavior following immortality priming: experimental tests of factors with implications for CVE interventions

ABSTRACT

As the field of countering violent extremism (CVE) evolves, increased emphasis has been placed on the development of interventions intended to be individually tailored to the needs of intervention program participants. Despite such emphasis, there is scant empirical research, much less experimental research, regarding psychological mechanisms that either bolster, or hinder, the effectiveness of such interventions. The present study experimentally tested two factors, in addition to accounting for a third, for their effects on an outcome potentially germane to a wide range of tailored CVE interventions: participants’ voluntary, unsupervised behavior toward out-group members.

Specifically, based upon Terror Management Theory, the present study answered the following questions.

• (1) Might priming individuals with notions of immortality (vs. controls) tend to cause them to increase their generosity and decrease their in-group bias, as demonstrated in a behavioral outcome (monetary donations)?

• (2) If so, is that effect positively associated with individuals’ level of collectivism?

• (3) Might individuals react differently to immortality primes, based on whether they are spiritual believers vs. nonbelievers? Specifically, might believers – whose meaning system presumably has not been threatened by such primes – tend to demonstrate, a greater reduction of in-group bias?

Immortality priming did not significantly reduce in-group bias. However, it strongly interacted with spiritual beliefs such that spiritual believers gave more when primed with immortality. Collectivism was positively associated with donations, which tended to be more generous both when individuals gave to racial in-group members, and among donors who were unbelievers. Applications for individually tailored interventions for CVE are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Terror management theory
• meaning maintenance model
• collectivism
• religion
• in-group bias
• priming
• countering violent extremism
• CVE

Acknowledgements

Additionally, this work was adapted from the author’s dissertation: Williams, M. J. (2014). Terror management theory upside down: Prosocial behavior following immortality priming (Doctoral dissertation). ProQuest Dissertations and Theses (Order No. 3625810).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Michael J. Williams http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5630-9814

Notes

1. In the prevention literature, such program types are among those referred to as ‘secondary prevention.’

2. In the prevention literature, such program types are referred to as ‘primary prevention.’

3. See Appendix 1 for the complete method and procedures.

4. Social factors are variables that can affect thoughts and behaviors in social situations: how humans tend to behave in a given social situation (Social factors, 2016).

5. The jigsaw classroom is a cooperative strategy that can reduce prejudice, among students, by creating mutual interdependencies among them in working toward a common learning objective (Aronson & Bridgeman, 1979; Aronson & Thibodeau, 1992).

6. Individual difference variables are characteristics that vary across individuals (e.g. age, depression, gender, intelligence), and often are studied as independent variables (Shaughnessy, Zechmeister, & Zechmeister, 2000).

7. Authoritarianism is a construct of interpersonal power and authority, such that those high in authoritarianism tend to be deferential to those whom they believe to be in positions of authority. Conversely, those low in authoritarianism tend to be relatively more questioning of the legitimacy of authorities’ power (Adorno, Frenkel-Brunswik, Levinson, & Sanford, 1950).

8. Subliminal priming is the presentation of a stimulus below the threshold of conscious awareness (e.g. presenting, then removing, a stimulus so quickly that an individual is unware of having experienced it).

9. Temporal discontinuity is a break in the chronological consistency (e.g. direction or speed), of a given experience: for example, imagining the past from a future perspective.

10. Supraliminal priming is the presentation of a stimulus above the threshold of conscious awareness (e.g. presenting a stimulus for a duration long enough for an individual to be aware of having experienced it).

11. See Appendix 1 for complete method, procedures, and results. Key method, procedures, and results are featured in the body of this article.

12. A dependent variable is a measured outcome, presumed to be caused by a preceding (independent) variable (Collier, 2016).

13. An independent variable is a presumed cause of a measured outcome (dependent) variable (Collier, 2016).

14. See Appendix 1 for results featuring statistical significance levels.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported in part by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship under grant [1320-123-0053].