Jolanda Jetten
Biographic Data
| ID | 139341 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Jolanda Jetten |
| GIVEN NAMES | Jolanda |
| FAMILY NAME | Jetten |
| SIGNATURE | JETTEN J |
| AFFILIATIONS | The University of Queensland |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-7588-5355 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 191 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 2376 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 188 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 3 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1994 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 25 |
Fossil fuel reliance and public support for climate change mitigation
Fossil fuel reliant countries contribute disproportionately to climate change, yet little is known about how nations’ fossil fuel reliance relates to public support for climate change mitigation. A large cross-national study (N = 101,956) across 105 countries and six continents showed that citizens of nations with greater fossil fuel reliance were less likely to believe that climate change should be a priority for their government, more supportiv…
Economic inequality is linked to citizens viewing individuals as more responsible for climate change mitigation than governments
As global support for climate action grows, the debate has shifted to who bears primary responsibility for climate change mitigation: individuals or systemic actors like governments. The present study (N = 76,320) examined the relationship between national economic inequality and citizens' views on who is responsible for climate change mitigation. Across 72 countries, we found that citizens living in nations with greater (vs. lower) levels of eco…
Institutional quality shapes who citizens hold responsible for climate change mitigation
Public beliefs about who is primarily responsible for climate change mitigation vary widely across countries, and little is known about what explains this variation. Drawing on data from 106 countries ( N = 101,728), we examined how indicators of national institutional quality (government effectiveness, regulatory quality, control of corruption, and rule of law) shape people's attributions of climate responsibility to governments, businesses, and…
Men's Allyship for Workplace Gender Equality
This research examines how different argument frames—moral, economic, and interpersonal ties—shape evaluations of men's support for workplace gender equality. Across three studies in Australia ( N = 1006), both men and women rated argument persuasiveness and assessed the motivations of men's allyship supporting workplace gender equality. Study 1 used conceptual content analysis to identify common argument frames; Studies 2 and 3 experimentally te…
The Role of (Non)religious Worldviews and Morality in Explaining Attitudes Towards Outgroups
Cisgender Women Underestimate Support for the Inclusion of Transgender Women in the Group ‘Women’
Individuals sometimes misjudge the views of others in their group, believing that their own attitudes differ from those held by the majority. Across five studies (N = 1159) conducted in Australia and the United Kingdom, we assessed the similarity between cisgender women’s own beliefs and their perceptions of the group norm (i.e., other cisgender women) regarding the inclusion of transgender women within the boundaries of womanhood. We found robus…
Negative Reactions to Positive Gender Stereotypes
I'm Very Lucky Because This Is Even Better
Evidence shows that meaningful social connections and social identities following trauma can support positive post‐trauma appraisals because they provide psychosocial resources needed for recovery. However, access to these resources is influenced by a process of social identity revitalisation— a change in the value and meaningfulness of these relationships and social identities. This study used a qualitative methodology to explore these social pr…
(Re‐)conceptualising Post‐Traumatic Growth
Traditional models of post‐traumatic growth (PTG) focus mostly on the role of individual processes in its development, often at the cost of understanding processes other than individual‐level factors that can shape positive post‐trauma appraisals and recovery. In this perspectives piece, we seek to address this imbalance by developing an understanding of PTG that accounts for the ways that our membership of social groups pre‐ and post‐trauma affe…
Individuals From Higher Social Classes View Charitable Giving as a Solution to Societal Issues
Charitable giving is often seen as a flexible and efficient way to address societal issues. However, it has also been criticised for having the potential to undermine governmental responsibility for providing public services and leading to concentrations of power. Across three studies, we investigated whether high social class is linked to viewing charitable giving favourably and as fulfilling an important function in society. We found correlatio…
The Elite Global Citizen
In four studies, we provide the first empirical examination of how wealth relates to cosmopolitan identity and its consequences for charitable intentions. Study 1 demonstrated that wealth positively predicted cosmopolitan identity in a 60‐nation dataset ( n = 90,350). Study 2 replicated this finding with multi‐item measures in the United States, India and Australia (total n = 861); self‐esteem and self‐efficacy accounted for this association. Stu…
The Impact of Holistic Justice on the Long‐Term Experiences and Wellbeing of Mass Human Rights Violation Survivors
Research highlights the long‐term collective effects of mass human rights violations (MHRVs) on survivors’ wellbeing. This multi‐method, multi‐context paper combines the social identity approach (SIA), transitional and social justice theories and human rights‐conceptualised wellbeing to propose a human rights understanding of trauma responses and experiences in the context of MHRVs. In Study 1, ethnographic research in four locations in Kosova, 5…
The impact of generative artificial intelligence on socioeconomic inequalities and policy making
Generative artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to both exacerbate and ameliorate existing socioeconomic inequalities. In this article, we provide a state-of-the-art interdisciplinary overview of the potential impacts of generative AI on (mis)information and three information-intensive domains: work, education, and healthcare. Our goal is to highlight how generative AI could worsen existing inequalities while illuminating how AI may hel…
New Groups and Post-Traumatic Growth
This paper provides the first experimental test of whether two social identity model of traumatic identity change processes—(i) group membership gain, and (ii) group membership continuity—predict post-traumatic growth (PTG) and post-traumatic stress (PTS) via social identity revitalization. Participants ( N = 210, M age = 49.59 years) were adult flood survivors who were randomly allocated to one of three conditions: group membership gain, group m…
Perceived Inequality Increases Support for Structural Solutions to Climate Change
Economic inequality is fuelling climate change. The question, however, remains whether the degree to which people perceive their country as unequal influences their motivation to support climate policies. Across three studies ( N = 1,459), we investigated whether perceived inequality influences people’s support for structural climate policies over policies aimed at individual-level behavior change. In an Australian (Study 1) and a United Kingdom …
Tackling loneliness together
In recent years, there has been growing recognition of the threats to health posed by loneliness. One of the main strategies that has been recommended to address this is social prescribing (SP). This typically involves general practitioners (GPs) and other health practitioners directing clients who are experiencing loneliness and related conditions to take part in social activities—typically in recreational and community contexts. However, eviden…
Fight like hell”
Losing an election can be a huge blow. As a result, most elections are associated with a mixture of trepidation and optimism (outgroup vs. ingroup political party winning, respectively). However, we propose that levels of anxiety and future dread in the context of an election are enhanced when society is characterised by deep intergroup divisions and morally charged polarisation. Across two studies spanning two national elections (the 2020 U.S. p…
Caught between two worlds
This study investigates the identity processes among second‐generation Afghans living in Iran and evaluates the relevance of the social identity model of social change (SIMIC) to understand their unique experiences. We conducted 23 in‐depth interviews and analysed the data using grounded theory method. The findings show that Afghan youths' efforts towards integration often fail due to unfavourable responses from the host society, compounded by th…
Meta‐identification
In the present research, we introduce and develop the concept of meta‐identification – perceptions of others’ identification with a group – and examine its capacity to shape group life. Across two cross‐sectional studies and three experiments ( N total = 3992), we investigate the relationship between participants’ meta‐identification in an intragroup context and their group meaningfulness, collective self‐efficacy, organisational citizenship beha…
The social grounds of personal self
Many lay people believe that the best way to develop a clear sense of ‘who you are’ is to shut yourself off from others and engage in introspection. Increasingly, however, empirical evidence points to the social aspects of identities and identity development. Building on this, we argue that a strong sense of personal identity is more likely to be derived from meaningful social interaction. More specifically, we argue that when communication allow…
We’re not as great as we used to be
We examined whether perceived national status threat—i.e., perceiving that one’s country’s status on the international scene is in decline—predicts increased desire for a strong conservative or progressive leader through greater national nostalgia and collective angst. A pilot study on strong leaders’ speeches from the 2017 French presidential election campaign first revealed that both conservative and progressive strong leaders use the status th…
Identifying different ‘types’ of participants in the Chilean student movement
Around the world, we witness not only growing levels of economic inequality but also the rise of protests whereby people from different social classes are demanding a more equal society. Our research uses a person‐centered approach to examine subgroups of participants in a social movement against inequality on the basis of their social class, intention to participate in conventional and/or radical collective actions, and social identification wit…
Audiences’ emotional response to choir singing by people living with mental health conditions
Growing evidence shows that choirs improve the well-being of people experiencing chronic mental health conditions; however, the impact of performances by “recovery choirs” (i.e., singers with mental health conditions) on their community audience members has not been examined. In three studies, we explored whether performances foster positive emotions toward recovery choristers. In Study 1, we surveyed 50 audience members before and after a public…
Restless in an Unequal World
Building on theories explaining social outcomes of economic inequality, our research examined the psychological impact of inequality on the desire for wealth and status. Our studies provide both experimental (Studies 1 and 3, Ns = 321 and 596) and correlational (Study 2; N = 141,477 from 73 countries and regions) evidence that higher inequality heightens people’s desire for wealth and status. Notably, this effect of inequality on desire is indepe…
Moral Expansiveness Around the World
What are the things that we think matter morally, and how do societal factors influence this? To date, research has explored several individual-level and historical factors that influence the size of our ‘moral circles.' There has, however, been less attention focused on which societal factors play a role. We present the first multi-national exploration of moral expansiveness—that is, the size of people’s moral circles across countries. We found …
Social Identity, Health and Well-Being
The social environment comprising communities, families, neighbourhoods, work teams, and various other forms of social group is not simply an external feature of the world that provides a context for individual behaviour.Instead these groups impact on the psychology of individuals through their capacity to be internalised as part of a person's social identity.If groups provide individuals with a sense of meaning, purpose, and belonging (i.e. a po…
Using social and behavioural science to support Covid-19 pandemic response
When group membership gets personal
Identity fusion is a relatively unexplored form of alignment with groups that entails a visceral feeling of oneness with the group. This feeling is associated with unusually porous, highly permeable borders between the personal and social self. These porous borders encourage people to channel their personal agency into group behavior, raising the possibility that the personal and social self will combine synergistically to motivate pro-group beha…
Explaining the Appeal of Populist Right‐Wing Parties in Times of Economic Prosperity
The assumption that populist right‐wing parties (PRWPs) thrive when the economy slows down is remarkably pervasive. What is often neglected is evidence showing PRWPs can thrive in times of economic prosperity. To examine this, we conducted an experiment in which participants were exposed to different appraisals of the future of the national economy and were subsequently asked to evaluate an anti‐immigration speech (Study 1). Results showed strong…
Out of mind but back in sight
For a variety of reasons, social perceivers may often attempt to actively inhibit stereotypic thoughts before their effects impinge on judgment and behavior. However, research on the psychology of mental control raises doubts about the efficacy of this strategy. Indeed, this work suggests that when people attempt to suppress unwanted thoughts, these thoughts are likely to subsequently reappear with even greater insistence than if they had never b…
Social group memberships protect against future depression, alleviate depression symptoms and prevent depression relapse
On the nature of identity fusion
Previous research has documented the consequences of feeling fused with a group; here we examine the nature of identity fusion. Specifically, we sought to determine what fusion is and the mediating mechanisms that lead fused individuals to make extraordinary sacrifices for their group. Guided by the assumption that fusion emphasizes the extent to which people develop relational ties to the group, we developed a measure designed to capture feeling…
Intergroup norms and intergroup discrimination
Manipulation of in-group and out-group norms of discrimination and fairness allowed for the operation of competing social identity principles concerning in-group bias, conformity, and group distinctiveness. The combined effects of these principles on in-group bias were first examined in a modified minimal-group setting (Study 1). Results demonstrated that participants' allocation strategies were in accord with the in-group norm. Furthermore, diss…
Why a nudge is not enough
Policy makers can use four different modes of governance: ‘hierarchy’, ‘markets’, ‘networks’ and ‘persuasion’. In this article, it is argued that ‘nudging’ represents a distinct (fifth) mode of governance. The effectiveness of nudging as a means of bringing about lasting behaviour change is questioned and it is argued that evidence for its success ignores the facts that many successful nudges are not in fact nudges; that there are instances when …
Intergroup Distinctiveness and Differentiation
The authors examined the relation between perceptions of intergroup distinctiveness and intergroup differentiation in a meta-analysis. They tested the social identity theory prediction that low intergroup distinctiveness underlies differentiation (the "reactive distinctiveness" hypothesis) for effects on behavioral and judgmental differentiation. In addition, they examined the moderating power of 4 variables that H. Tajfel and J. C. Turner (1979)…
Advancing the social identity approach to health and well‐being
The health of people's body and mind is powerfully conditioned by social factors that affect their social identity. Consistent with this notion, there is a growing interest in the way that group memberships (and the social identities derived from belonging to these groups) affect health and well‐being. To the extent that group memberships provide individuals with meaning, support, and agency (i.e., a positive sense of social identity), health is …
We're all individuals’
Three studies were conducted to investigate the power of group norms of individualism and collectivism to guide self‐definition and group behavior for people with low and high levels of group identification. Study 1 demonstrates that in an individualist culture (North America), those who identify highly with their national identity are more individualist than low identifiers. In contrast, in a collectivist culture (Indonesia) high identifiers are…
What makes a group worth dying for? Identity fusion fosters perception of familial ties, promoting self-sacrifice
We sought to identify the mechanisms that cause strongly fused individuals (those who have a powerful, visceral feeling of oneness with the group) to make extreme sacrifices for their group. A large multinational study revealed a widespread tendency for fused individuals to endorse making extreme sacrifices for their country. Nevertheless, when asked which of several groups they were most inclined to die for, most participants favored relatively …
Social identities promote well‐being because they satisfy global psychological needs
Social identities are known to improve well‐being, but why is this? We argue that this is because they satisfy basic psychological needs, specifically, the need to belong, the need for self‐esteem, the need for control and the need for meaningful existence. A longitudinal study ( N = 70) revealed that gain in identity strength was associated with increased need satisfaction over 7 months. A cross‐sectional study ( N = 146) revealed that social id…
No guts, no glory
How Groups Affect Our Health and Well‐Being
Considerable evidence now exists that people can draw on social groups in order to maintain and enhance health and well‐being. We review this evidence and suggest that social identity theorizing, and its development in the social identity approach to health and well‐being, can help us to understand the way that groups, and the identities that underpin them, can promote a social cure. Specifically, we propose that social groups are important psych…
The past as a determinant of the present
We propose that the perceived continuity between a group's past and present can be a psychological resource that provides confidence in the group's future vitality, thereby reducing the need to preserve identity. In two studies, English participants were told that there was continuity or discontinuity between England's past and present. Both studies showed that higher identifiers (but not lower identifiers) experienced more collective angst (i.e.…
What's left behind
Previous research has demonstrated that nostalgia for the past can have positive consequences for individuals' psychological well-being and their perceived ability to cope with challenges in the present (Wildschut, Sedikides, Arndt, & Routledge, 2006). We propose that this effect is limited to circumstances in which individuals have maintained identity continuity between the past and the present. Support for this moderation hypothesis is obtained…
Personal and Political
Post‐traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) has always been controversial and highly politicized. Here, using a social identity approach, we review evidence that trauma and its aftermath are fundamentally linked to social position, sociopolitical capital, and power. We begin this contribution by demonstrating how a person's group memberships (and the social identities they derive from these memberships) are inherently linked to the experience of advers…
Economic inequality and the rise of far‐right populism
It is argued that far‐right (FR) populism in the West is fuelled by inequality. In this paper, we argue that three social psychological processes are central to explaining these phenomena. We suggest that these processes are recursive although we do not specify their temporal order. Drawing on the social identity tradition, we first examine how inequality is linked to reduced social trust and cohesion, which has consequences for both low‐ and hig…
Social cure, what social cure? The propensity to underestimate the importance of social factors for health
Negotiating dual identities
We propose that to understand how rejection perceptions affect immigrants' acculturation orientations, we need to take account of perceptions of rejection and group identification with both the host society and the country of origin. In line with previous work, we found among Romanians and Moroccan immigrants in France that perceived French rejection directly affected French identification and acculturation orientations. In addition, perceived re…
The impact of economic inequality on conspiracy beliefs
Consequences of Economic Inequality for the Social and Political Vitality of Society
Economic inequality has been found to have pernicious effects, reducing mental and physical health, decreasing societal cohesion, and fueling support for nativist parties and illiberal autocratic leaders. We start this review with an outline of what social identity theorizing offers to the study of inequality. We then articulate four hypotheses that can be derived from the social identity approach: the fit hypothesis, the wealth‐categorization hy…
Regaining In-Group Continuity in Times of Anxiety About the Group's Future
Collective nostalgia for the good old days of the country thrives across the world. However, little is known about the social psychological dynamics of this collective emotion across cultures. We predicted that collective nostalgia is triggered by collective angst as it helps people to restore a sense of in-group continuity via stronger in-group belonging and out-group rejection (in the form of opposition to immigrants). Based on a sample (N = 5,…
Out of mind but back in sight
For a variety of reasons, social perceivers may often attempt to actively inhibit stereotypic thoughts before their effects impinge on judgment and behavior. However, research on the psychology of mental control raises doubts about the efficacy of this strategy. Indeed, this work suggests that when people attempt to suppress unwanted thoughts, these thoughts are likely to subsequently reappear with even greater insistence than if they had never b…
Intergroup norms and intergroup discrimination
Manipulation of in-group and out-group norms of discrimination and fairness allowed for the operation of competing social identity principles concerning in-group bias, conformity, and group distinctiveness. The combined effects of these principles on in-group bias were first examined in a modified minimal-group setting (Study 1). Results demonstrated that participants' allocation strategies were in accord with the in-group norm. Furthermore, diss…
Distinctiveness threat and prototypicality
The combined influence on ingroup bias of threat to group distinctiveness and prototypicality as a group member was examined in two studies. It was predicted, in line with social identity theory, that threat to group distinctiveness would lead to more ingroup bias. In addition, on the basis of self-categorization theory it was predicted that protypical and peripheral group members would react differently to a threat to their group distinctiveness…
Strength of identification and intergroup differentiation
The present study aimed at showing that the relationship between identification and ingroup bias is moderated by salient group norms that prescribe or proscribe differentiation in an intergroup context. A study (N=191) in which level of identification and group norms were manipulated showed that high identifiers acted more in accordance with a salient differentiation norm compared to low identifiers. When a fairness norm was made salient, however…
Defining dimensions of distinctiveness
We tested the prediction, derived from an integration of social identity and self-categorization principles, that the relation between in-group distinctiveness and positive differentiation is curvilinear. Moderate distinctiveness is argued to provide the critical combination of intergroup difference (self-categorization theory) and intergroup similarity (social identity theory) to elicit intergroup differentiation. Intergroup distance (difference…
Discrimination Constrained and Justified
Rebels with a Cause
Two studies involving people with body piercings tested the hypothesis that perceived discrimination increases group identification. In Study 1, group identification mediated the positive relationship between perceived discrimination and attempts to differentiate the ingroup from the mainstream. In Study 2, perceived discrimination against people with body piercings was manipulated and was found to increase group identification. Support was found…
Similarity as a source of differentiation
The present research examines the relation between perceived intergroup distinctiveness and positive intergroup differentiation. It was hypothesised that the distinctiveness–differentiation relation is a function of group identification. In two studies group distinctiveness was varied and level of identification was either measured (Study 1) or manipulated (Study 2). Results support the prediction that low group distinctiveness leads to more posi…
On being peripheral
We examined collective self‐esteem and personal self‐esteem as a function of anticipated changes in one's prototypicality within a valued ingroup. In Study 1 (N = 80), all participants received information that they were currently peripheral group members. Expectations for the future were then manipulated, with some expecting to become more prototypical and others expecting they would be even more peripheral in the future. In addition, the source…
We're all individuals’
Three studies were conducted to investigate the power of group norms of individualism and collectivism to guide self‐definition and group behavior for people with low and high levels of group identification. Study 1 demonstrates that in an individualist culture (North America), those who identify highly with their national identity are more individualist than low identifiers. In contrast, in a collectivist culture (Indonesia) high identifiers are…
Predicting the Paths of Peripherals
Two studies investigated how both degree of identification and the individual’s position within the group influence aspects of group loyalty. The authors considered ingroup position in terms of both the individual’s current position within a group and expectations concerning the likelihood that one’s position might change in the future. Peripheral group members learned that their acceptance by other group members would improve in the future or th…
The divisive potential of differences and similarities
In this article we examine the relationship between perceptions of intergroup distinctiveness and intergroup differentiation. Research in this area has highlighted two contrasting hypotheses: high distinctiveness is predicted to lead to increased intergroup differentiation (self-categorisation theory), while low distinctiveness or too much similarity can also underlie positive differentiation (social identity theory). We argue for a theoretical i…
Not being what you claim to be
We examine the notion of impostors within groups, defined in this paper as people who make public claims to an identity while disguising their failure to fulfil key criteria for group membership. In Experiment 1, vegetarians showed heightened levels of negative affect toward vegetarians who ate meat occasionally compared to an authentic vegetarian. In contrast, non‐vegetarians saw the impostor to be marginally more likeable than the authentic veg…
Individualist and collectivist norms
We conducted two studies to investigate the influence of group norms endorsing individualism and collectivism on the evaluations of group members who display individualist or collectivist behaviour. It was reasoned that, overall, collectivist behaviour benefits the group and would be evaluated more positively than would individualist behaviour. However, it was further predicted that this preference would be attenuated by the specific content of t…
Social identity, social influence and reactions to potentially stressful tasks
An experiment was conducted to investigate the role that social influence plays in the appraisal of a potentially stressful situation. Participants (N = 40) preparing for a mental arithmetic task were exposed to a message in which the task was described as stressful or challenging. The message was delivered by the same person in each condition but this person was said to be either an ingroup member (a University student) or an outgroup member (a …
The Individual Within the Group
Many theorists have wrestled with the notion of how people balance their need to be included in social groups with their need to be different and distinctive. This question is particularly salient to researchers from the social identity perspective, who have traditionally viewed individual differentiation within groups as being inimical to group identification. In this article we present a number of strategies that people can use to balance their…
Suppressing the negative effect of devaluation on group identification
Intergroup Distinctiveness and Differentiation
The authors examined the relation between perceptions of intergroup distinctiveness and intergroup differentiation in a meta-analysis. They tested the social identity theory prediction that low intergroup distinctiveness underlies differentiation (the "reactive distinctiveness" hypothesis) for effects on behavioral and judgmental differentiation. In addition, they examined the moderating power of 4 variables that H. Tajfel and J. C. Turner (1979)…
Taking the strain
The social identity/self-categorization model of stress suggests that social identity can play a role in protecting group members from adverse reactions to strain because it provides a basis for group members to receive and benefit from social support. To examine this model, two studies were conducted with groups exposed to extreme levels of strain: patients recovering from heart surgery (Study 1), bomb disposal officers and bar staff (Study 2). …
Loyalty Without Conformity
We argue that members of individualist cultures balance their desire to belong with their desire to be different by maintaining a self-image as being loyal but relatively immune to group influence. Consistent with this, in Study 1 there was a strong tendency for people to rate themselves as being more independent (i.e., less conformist) than other people in their college. College students also rated themselves as being highly loyal to the group, …
When differences matter
The present study examined the effect of intergroup distinctiveness and group membership on evaluations of impostors. We predicted that ingroup members would be harsher than outgroup members on an impostor and that perceptions of intergroup distinctiveness would further moderate these evaluations. Specifically, we tested the social identity theory prediction that low intergroup distinctiveness would lead to greater derogation of the impostor (the…
The impact of individualist and collectivist group norms on evaluations of dissenting group members
Reconciling Individuality and the Group
Introduction
Individuality and the Group
This book brings together an international selection of prominent researchers at the forefront of this development. They reflect on the issue of individuality in the group and on how thinking about social identity has changed. Together, these chapters chart a key development in the field: how social identity perspectives inform understanding of cohesion, unity and collective action, but also how they help us understand individuality, agency, auto…
Psychology (171 works) · Social Psychology (159 works) · Social and Intergroup Psychology (102 works) · Political science (86 works) · Sociology (70 works) · Cultural Differences and Values (64 works) · Social Psychology (63 works) · Social group (62 works) · Social identity theory (62 works) · Law (44 works)