A Public Affair: The Effects of Perceived Morality on the Expression of Negative Group Directed Attitudes and Behaviors

Previous work has shown that perceptions of immorality can lead to the expression of negative group directed attitudes. Therefore the present study investigated whether increased perceptions of morality could decrease explicit negative group directed attitudes. For Study 1, 262 participants received a manipulation intended to increase how moral, competent, or warm they perceived people from their opposing political party to be, then completed a measure assessing their explicit negative attitudes and behaviors towards the opposing political party. For Study 2, 163 participants received a similar manipulation and completed the same explicit attitudes measure, but also took an implicit attitudes measure towards the opposing political party. For both studies, participants who received the moral manipulation did not report lower negative attitudes than participants in the warmth, competence, or control conditions. However, perceived morality was the best predictor of negative explicit attitudes for both studies, while all perception types equally predicted negative implicit attitudes. Despite the lack of support for the primary hypotheses, the current work supports the argument that perceptions of morality play a strong, unique role in the public expression of negative group directed attitudes.

Grantor dc:publisher

Wake Forest University

Year dc:date.issued

2017

Author dc:creator

• Howard, Kathryn Anne

• Attitudes

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/10339/82223

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:wakespace.lib.wfu.edu:10339/82223