Michael Wenzel
Biographic Data
| ID | 132250 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Michael Wenzel |
| GIVEN NAMES | Michael |
| FAMILY NAME | Wenzel |
| SIGNATURE | WENZEL M |
| AFFILIATIONS | Flinders University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-2839-9482 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 98 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 484 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 98 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1993 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 14 |
From referendum to reconciliation: How shared values and identities align with a commitment to long‐term collective action
One formal mechanism for effecting change to progress the rights of structurally disadvantaged groups is via citizen referenda. However, referenda are often characterized by divisive public debate. We suggest that sustaining action for long‐term change (beyond a referendum itself) may be associated with identifying with an opinion‐based group and perceiving shared values between advantaged and disadvantaged groups. Among a nationally representati…
Examining Motivational Profiles of Forgiveness in the Workplace: An Employee-Centered Approach
Forgiveness is often conceptualized as an ethical response to workplace transgressions with the potential to repair strained relationships between organizational members. However, the act of forgiveness is not always accompanied by prosocial intentions; scholars have theorized that there is a qualitative difference between forgiveness that genuinely expresses an internal sentiment of benevolence versus forgiveness that is expressed but lacks corr…
“修己安人 Cultivating Oneself to Benefit Others”: A qualitative study on self-forgiveness in China
Beyond Resistance: Understanding Trait Self-Control Through Strategic Indulgence
Trait self-control is often equated with resistance, leaving open whether it also involves domain-general conflict minimization and the strategic indulgence of low-conflict desires. We reanalyzed four ambulatory assessment datasets ( N = 559 participants with 32,049 measurement occasions) to test whether these mechanisms explain the well-being benefits of trait self-control. Results showed that individuals high in self-control experienced fewer d…
Affective variability prospectively predicts higher affective well-being, but only when people feel low
Previous studies have predominantly viewed affective variability as detrimental to well-being, suggesting an unstable emotional state. However, research on early warning signs of affective disorders suggests that affective variability may also be adaptive, particularly when individuals' affective well-being is low. Here, we sought to test that greater affective variability would predict increased affective well-being over time (Hypothesis 1), or …
Silenced voice: Social identity, (empathetic) collective angst, and the troubled referendum to empower Indigenous Australians
Public policies designed to empower historically victimized groups rely on support from members of the perpetrator group (the dominant majority), who may wrestle with two concerns: a collective angst for the future vitality (continuity, prosperity) of their national ingroup and an empathetic collective angst for the future vitality of the victim group. A two‐wave survey of non‐Indigenous Australians ( N = 797/410) pre and post the 2023 Australian…
Transformative Moral Repair Following Interpersonal Transgressions: Post-Transgression Relationship Growth
Research often views relationship repair through a reparative lens of relationship partners attempting to fix what was damaged or broken by the transgression. We argue here for a transformative lens to view transgressions as potential catalysts for the strengthening of relationships or what we term: post-transgression relationship growth (PTRG). However, we also argue that PTRG is more likely achieved when the transgression is dealt with dyadical…
Strategy‐Situation Fit of Proactive Emotion Regulation and the Role of Personality
INTRODUCTION: Research on emotion regulation has primarily focused on reactive strategies, while proactive emotion regulation remains less understood. This study investigates proactive emotion regulation through situation selection, where individuals deliberately choose environments to promote desirable emotional outcomes, and examines how this strategy adapts to contextual demands (strategy-situation fit). METHODS: We reanalyzed an ambulatory as…
What makes self-forgiveness so difficult (for some)? Understanding the lived experience of those stuck in self-condemnation
Unraveling the link between neuroticism and well-being in daily life: The role of event occurrence, event appraisals, affective reactivity, and affective recovery
Recent studies suggest a robust link between neuroticism and daily fluctuations in affective well-being. However, the specific affective processes that underlie this association remain unclear. This study examines four affective processes, event frequency/intensity, event appraisal, affective reactivity, and affective recovery, for both positive and negative events. To address these questions, we synthesized findings from five ambulatory assessme…
Neuroticism is Associated With Greater Affective Variability at High Levels of Momentary Affective Well‐Being, but With Lower Affective Variability at Low Levels of Momentary Affective Well‐Being
OBJECTIVE: Research challenged the notion that neuroticism correlates with affective variability, suggesting that it may result from statistical artifacts due to the non-normal distribution of negative affect. We aim to advance this line of research by (a) introducing affect balance as a normally distributed measure of affective well-being and (b) examining current affect balance as a moderator of the relationship between neuroticism and affect b…
What Is, What Was and What Could Be: Simultaneously Comparing How Emotional Reactions to the Past, Present and Future Predict Collective Action
Although separate research programs examine how emotional reactions to the past, present and future predict collective action, research has yet to compare them simultaneously. Across three studies ( N = 2764) and two social issues (plastic pollution and abortion), we examined whether reflecting on a positive or negative past, present or future elicits distinct emotions which indirectly predict collective action. Results revealed multiple counterv…
When the Smoke Will Not Clear: Examining the Longitudinal Effects of Political Despair on Well‐Being and Collective Climate Action
Averting the existential risks that climate change poses requires sustained collective action, yet little is known about the factors that maintain versus undermine such commitment over time. This study tests whether participants' ( N = 871) experience of political despair about climate change undermines long‐term collective climate action engagement both directly and indirectly because it diminishes well‐being (operationalised as stress, resilien…
No Matter What We Do, Nothing Is Enough: A Qualitative Investigation of Political Despair
People often report experiencing despair about social issues like racial inequality and climate change. We conceptualise these feelings as political despair and consider: what causes political despair, that is, what are the antecedent appraisals? Participants, who felt despair about racial inequality ( N = 196) or climate change ( N = 179), responded to a prompt about why they feel despair about this issue. A framework analysis of participants re…
Conspiracy beliefs and democratic backsliding: Longitudinal effects of election conspiracy beliefs on criticism of democracy and support for authoritarianism during political contests
There are widespread concerns that conspiracy theories undermine democracies. But do conspiracy beliefs increase criticism of democracy and/or support for authoritarianism? Or are antidemocratic people more likely to endorse conspiracy beliefs? To answer these important questions, we collected longitudinal data during two concurrent democratic elections—the 2020 US Presidential Election (N = 609) and the 2020 General Election in New Zealand (N = …
Momentary health behaviour cues are moderated by educational attainment: Findings from two ecological momentary assessment studies
The role of truth in victim–offender mediation: Victims of crime who feel they know the “whole” truth are more receptive to apologies
OBJECTIVE: We conducted three preregistered studies to examine whether victims of crime are more receptive to apologies in victim-offender mediation if they feel they know the "whole" truth about a crime. HYPOTHESES: We predicted that making salient the completeness (vs. incompleteness) of knowledge about a crime would lead victims to (a) have a greater sense of truth knowing and (b) view an apology more favorably. METHOD: Participants in Study 1…
Emotion regulation and self‐control: Same same but different… and even incompatible
OBJECTIVE: We explore the idea that inhibitory self-control and prohedonic emotion regulation may be incompatible concerns. BACKGROUND: Specifically, we propose that because some forms of self-control involve denying oneself hedonic pleasures, it may lead to negative affect. Because people may then prioritize emotion regulation over self-control, negative affect may in turn lead to emotion regulation efforts, specifically the use of emotion regul…
Examining demand effects on direct and indirect affect measures in affect induction procedures
Affect induction procedures are effectively implemented in psychological research. However, because participants are typically asked to self-report their affect immediately after viewing emotional stimuli, the goal of eliciting affect is relatively easy for participants to infer, making their responses susceptible to demand effects. To examine this demand effect, research has used an unrelated-studies paradigm, in which participants are led to be…
Keeping score: Past victimization reduces offenders’ conciliatory sentiments for their present transgressions
Many relationships within which interpersonal transgressions transpire often involve histories of reciprocal wrongdoing, where each party has occupied both the role of victim and offender. We investigate whether past incidents of being wronged by the victim of a present transgression may dampen offenders’ conciliatory sentiments for their present wrongdoing. Across four studies (combined N = 1037), we find evidence that past victimization experie…
We despair’: Examining the role of political despair for collective action and well‐being
Anecdotally, people often report feeling despair about the political status quo. We conceptualise these feelings as political despair. But what is political despair, and what are its effects? We adapt intergroup emotion theory to analyse political despair in the context of racial inequality (Studies 1 and 2) and climate change (Study 3). Three cross‐sectional studies (total N = 866) tested the measurement of political despair (relative to anger a…
Turning Tables: Offenders Feel Like “Victims” When Victims Withhold Forgiveness
When offenders apologize to victims for a wrongdoing, they often expect forgiveness in return. Sometimes, however, victims may withhold forgiveness. Across four experimental studies, we find that offenders feel like “victims” when victims respond to their apologies with non-forgiveness. This can be explained by the fact that they interpret non-forgiveness as both a norm violation and a threat to their sense of power. Together, these mechanisms ca…
Let's talk about this: Co‐rumination and dyadic dynamics of moral repair following wrongdoing
Interpersonal transgressions threaten victims, offenders, and their relationships, often leading the parties to ruminate about the wrongdoing, not only individually but also together, in acts of co‐rumination . We investigate how two forms of co‐rumination—co‐reflection and co‐brooding—influence, or are influenced by, individual rumination and victim forgiveness or offender self‐forgiveness. Our study used a prospective‐longitudinal‐dyadic design…
Tensions between collective‐self forgiveness and political repair
Faced with collective guilt, perpetrator groups may seek collective‐self forgiveness. However, does this diminish their support for political repair? Advancing the concept of collective‐self forgiveness, we distinguish between end‐state collective‐self forgiveness as restored moral identity and two processes: pseudo collective‐self forgiveness as defensive downplaying and genuine collective‐self forgiveness as ‘working through’ the ingroup's guil…
Re-Inventing Ovid's Metamorphoses: Pictorial and Literary Transformations in Various Media, 1400–1800
Re-Inventing Ovid's Metamorphoses: Pictorial and Literary Transformations in Various Media, 1400–1800. Karl A. E. Enenkel and Jan L. de Jong, eds. Intersections 70. Leiden: Brill, 2021. xxviii + 475 pp. €165. - Volume 76 Issue 1
Towards tolerance: Representations of superordinate categories and perceived ingroup prototypicality
An analysis of norm processes in tax compliance
When “different” means “worse”: In-group prototypicality in changing intergroup contexts
Motivation or rationalisation? Causal relations between ethics, norms and tax compliance
The Multiplicity of Taxpayer Identities and Their Implications for Tax Ethics
It is argued that many social factors (ethics, norms, legitimacy) affecting tax compliance derive their meaning and potency from taxpayers’ identities—the way they position themselves socially, relative to other taxpayers and the tax authority. Based on survey data from 965 Australians, the present study investigates taxpayers’ identities at three different levels of inclusiveness (personal, subgroup, and national identity) and their implications…
Misperceptions of social norms about tax compliance: From theory to intervention
How acts of forgiveness restore a sense of justice: Addressing status/power and value concerns raised by transgressions
Commonly it is understood that forgiveness means sacrificing justice. However, the present study shows that the act of forgiving can increase a sense of justice, which in turn facilitates benevolent sentiments towards the offender. University students ( N = 88) imagined themselves as victims and, after the offender either did or did not offer an apology , they either were or were not instructed to express their forgiveness to the offender (via an…
A needs-based perspective on self-forgiveness: Addressing threat to moral identity as a means of encouraging interpersonal and intrapersonal restoration
Justice through consensus: Shared identity and the preference for a restorative notion of justice
We propose a concept of restorative justice as a sense of justice deriving from consensus about, and the reaffirmation of, values violated by an offence (in contrast to punishment‐based retributive justice). Victims should be more likely to seek restorative justice (and less likely retributive justice) when they perceive to share a relevant identity with the offender. In Study 1, when the relevant identity (university affiliation) shared with the…
Why We Punish in the Name of Justice: Just Desert versus Value Restoration and the Role of Social Identity
Apologies demanded yet devalued: Normative dilution in the age of apology
What Is Social about Justice? Inclusive Identity and Group Values as the Basis of the Justice Motive
No genuine self‐forgiveness without accepting responsibility: Value reaffirmation as a key to maintaining positive self‐regard
Measures of self‐forgiveness that merely focus on the outcome of positive self‐regard risk neglecting the process through which offenders restore it. They may thus tap pseudo self‐forgiveness where offenders downplay their responsibility for the wrongdoing. For genuine self‐forgiveness, the process should instead involve an attenuation of the negative link between responsibility acceptance and positive self‐regard. In this paper, we examine how a…
Beyond Retribution: Conceptualizing Restorative Justice and Exploring its Determinants
Punishment as restoration of group and offender values following a transgression: Value consensus through symbolic labelling and offender reform
Justice theory has suggested that transgressions pose a threat to the shared values that underlie broken rules or laws, suggesting that in order to address concerns over the values violated by an offence, perceived consensus regarding those values must be reaffirmed. However, little empirical research has been conducted examining how legal responses can address those value concerns. In the current research we argue that punishments, as a common r…
The psychological immune response in the face of transgressions: Pseudo self-forgiveness and threat to belonging
A Letter from the Tax Office: Compliance Effects of Informational and Interpersonal Justice
Third-party punishment and symbolic intragroup status
Legitimacy of regulatory authorities as a function of inclusive identification and power over ingroups and outgroups
To insure compliance with rules and laws, regulatory authorities are usually in a position of power over a heterogeneous population or multiple groups. Power may thus need to be analysed as a tripartite relationship between authority, ingroup and outgroup. Based on the social identity approach and related justice theories, it is argued that social identification with an inclusive category that includes ingroup, outgroup and authority determines h…
Social Identification As a Determinant of Concerns About Individual-, Group-, and Inclusive-Level Justice
Extending concepts of micro- and macrojustice, three levels of justice are distinguished. Individual-, group-, and inclusive-level justice are defined in terms of the target of justice concerns: one's individual treatment, one's group's treatment, and the distribution in the collective (e.g., nation). Individual-level justice permits a more narrowly defined frame of reference (group), whereas the other two levels imply a wider “inclusive category…
Refusing to apologize can have psychological benefits (and we issue no mea culpa for this research finding)
Despite an understanding of the perception and consequences of apologies for their recipients, little is known about the consequences of interpersonal apologies, or their denial, for the offending actor. In two empirical studies, we examined the unexplored psychological consequences that follow from a harm‐doer's explicit refusal to apologize. Results showed that the act of refusing to apologize resulted in greater self‐esteem than not refusing t…
A Long Time Coming: Delays in Collective Apologies and Their Effects on Sincerity and Forgiveness
Political apologies by one group to another often occur a significant period of time after the original transgression. What effect does such a delay have on perceptions of sincerity and forgiveness? A delayed apology could reflect the offender group's reluctance to apologize, or, alternatively, it could represent time and consideration spent on developing an appropriate response. In two studies, we found that a verbal collective apology, when del…
Do Retributive and Restorative Justice Processes Address Different Symbolic Concerns
We forgive”: A group’s act of forgiveness and its restorative effects on members’ feelings of justice and sentiments towards the offender group
Although typically conceptualized as a reconciliation outcome, we propose that intergroup forgiveness can also be construed as a decision or course of action that advances justice and positive intergroup sentiments among members of the victimized group. However, the process through which this occurs depends on the perceived differentiation between the groups. Following intergroup transgressions staged in the laboratory (Study 1) or reported in ne…
The varying meaning of forgiveness: Relationship closeness moderates how forgiveness affects feelings of justice
Psychological research has repeatedly shown that victims are more likely to forgive socially close than distant others, but little research has addressed the question whether forgiveness in these two cases actually has the same psychological meaning. As one approach to this issue, the present research investigates how acts of forgiveness aid the restoration of victims' justice feelings through different processes, depending on the closeness of th…
Bosnian history and Austro-Hungarian policy: The Zemaljski Muzej, Sarajevo, and the Bogomil romance
Evaluation of aggressive interactions in interpersonal and intergroup contexts
The article deals with possible differences in the evaluation of interpersonal and intergroup aggression. Study I investigated whether the typical perspective-specific divergence in judgments about aggressive interactions (with actors evaluating their behavior as more reasonable and less inappropriate than recipients) varied in interpersonal and intergroup contexts. Additionalty, the possible mediating influence of lay epistemic motivation and su…
Social Discrimination and Tolerance in Intergroup Relations: Reactions to Intergroup Difference
In this article, we present a theoretical approach to social discrimination on the one hand and intergroup relations characterized by tolerance and plurality on the other hand. Central to the analysis is the question of how members deal with intergroup difference. If the outgroup's difference is judged to be non-normative and inferior, devaluation, discrimination, and hostility are likely responses toward the outgroup. Judging the outgroup's diff…
Socio-structural characteristics of intergroup relations and identity management strategies: Results from a field study in East Germany
In a field study in East Germany, predictions by Social Identity Theory concerning relations among socio-structural characteristics of intergroup relations (stability, legitimacy, permeability) and identity management strategies (e.g. social competition) were examined. In general, East Germans were expected to consider their status position as inferior compared to West Germans. Moreover, depending on whether they regard such a status difference a…
Socio‐structural characteristics of intergroup relations and identity management strategies: Results from a field study in East Germany
In a field study in East Germany, predictions by Social Identity Theory concerning relations among socio-structural characteristics of intergroup relations (stability, legitimacy, permeability) and identity management strategies (e.g. social competition) were examined. In general, East Germans were expected to consider their status position as inferior compared to West Germans. Moreover, depending on whether they regard such a status difference a…
Justice and Social Conflict
This article analyzes possible effects of ideas of justice, perceptions of injustice, and the use of justice arguments on the emergence, course, and resolution of social conflicts. Four functions of justice are identified: (1) ideas of justice and perceptions of injustice can elicit or evoke social conflicts; (2) justice arguments and rhetorics can be used to support one's own position in a dispute; (3) the basic value and the principles and rule…
The impact of outcome orientation and justice concerns on tax compliance: The role of taxpayers' identity.
Previous research has yielded inconsistent evidence for the impact of justice perceptions on tax compliance. This article suggests a more differentiated view on the basis of 2 congenial theories of procedural and distributive justice. The group-value model and a categorization approach argue that taxpayers are more concerned about justice and less about personal outcomes when they identify strongly with the inclusive category within which procedu…
What Is Social about Justice? Inclusive Identity and Group Values as the Basis of the Justice Motive
The Ingroup as Pars Pro Toto: Projection From the Ingroup Onto the Inclusive Category as a Precursor to Social Discrimination
In an approach to intergroup discrimination and tolerance, it is assumed that the outgroup’s difference from the ingroup is evaluated with reference to the prototype of the higher-order category that includes both groups. Two correlational studies yielded evidence that (a) group members tend to perceive their ingroup as relatively prototypical for the inclusive category (projection), (b) members highly identified with both ingroup and inclusive c…
Toward Evidence‐based Tax Administration
An evidence‐based approach is being promoted and adopted in many public service areas, but tax authorities have so far only sporadically subscribed to it. We, first, present arguments for an evidence‐based approach to tax administration and outline its main features. Second, studies on the effects of tax‐reporting schedules are considered to illustrate the logic, potential challenges and outcomes of such an approach. Third, we discuss the main pr…
Towards tolerance: Representations of superordinate categories and perceived ingroup prototypicality
The social side of sanctions: Personal and social norms as moderators of deterrence.
In a survey of Australian citizens (valid N = 1,406), personal and social norms were found to moderate effects of deterrence on tax evasion. Personal, internalized norms of tax honesty were negatively related to tax evasion and moderated the effects of deterrence variables (i.e., sanction severity), suggesting deterrence effects only when individual ethics were weak. Perceived social norms, beyond those internalized as personal norms, were not di…
Of bikers, teachers and Germans: Groups' diverging views about their prototypicality
The in‐group projection model hypothesizes that members of social groups generalize attributes of their in‐group to a superordinate category that provides dimensions for comparisons between in‐group and out‐group (in‐group projection). As a result, both groups in an intergroup situation should disagree about their relative prototypicality for the superordinate category. Three studies confirmed this prediction. In Study 1 (N = 54), it was found th…
A social categorisation approach to distributive justice
In this chapter, I put forward an approach to distributive justice in terms of categorisation processes. It is assumed that a hierarchical set of social categorisations determine the identity of those individuals or groups considered for an allocation in a given situation, and whether or how these potential recipients are subcategorised and differentiated for decisions on their relative entitlement. I review empirical evidence for the approach an…
Social Identification As a Determinant of Concerns About Individual-, Group-, and Inclusive-Level Justice
Extending concepts of micro- and macrojustice, three levels of justice are distinguished. Individual-, group-, and inclusive-level justice are defined in terms of the target of justice concerns: one's individual treatment, one's group's treatment, and the distribution in the collective (e.g., nation). Individual-level justice permits a more narrowly defined frame of reference (group), whereas the other two levels imply a wider “inclusive category…
An analysis of norm processes in tax compliance
When “different” means “worse”: In-group prototypicality in changing intergroup contexts
Misperceptions of social norms about tax compliance: From theory to intervention
Motivation or rationalisation? Causal relations between ethics, norms and tax compliance
Legitimacy of regulatory authorities as a function of inclusive identification and power over ingroups and outgroups
To insure compliance with rules and laws, regulatory authorities are usually in a position of power over a heterogeneous population or multiple groups. Power may thus need to be analysed as a tripartite relationship between authority, ingroup and outgroup. Based on the social identity approach and related justice theories, it is argued that social identification with an inclusive category that includes ingroup, outgroup and authority determines h…
Why We Punish in the Name of Justice: Just Desert versus Value Restoration and the Role of Social Identity
A Letter from the Tax Office: Compliance Effects of Informational and Interpersonal Justice
Retributive and restorative justice
The emergence of restorative justice as an alternative model to Western, court-based criminal justice may have important implications for the psychology of justice. It is proposed that two different notions of justice affect responses to rule-breaking: restorative and retributive justice. Retributive justice essentially refers to the repair of justice through unilateral imposition of punishment, whereas restorative justice means the repair of jus…
Superordinate identities and intergroup conflict: The ingroup projection model
This chapter summarises results from a research programme on the psychological basis of tolerance and discrimination in intergroup relations, with particular consideration of the role of superordinate identities. According to the ingroup projection model, a relevant superordinate group provides dimensions and norms for comparisons between ingroup and outgroup. Groups gain positive value or status when they are considered prototypical for the (pos…
The Multiplicity of Taxpayer Identities and Their Implications for Tax Ethics
It is argued that many social factors (ethics, norms, legitimacy) affecting tax compliance derive their meaning and potency from taxpayers’ identities—the way they position themselves socially, relative to other taxpayers and the tax authority. Based on survey data from 965 Australians, the present study investigates taxpayers’ identities at three different levels of inclusiveness (personal, subgroup, and national identity) and their implications…
Psychology (86 works) · Social Psychology (85 works) · Political science (42 works) · Law (34 works) · Social and Intergroup Psychology (33 works) · Forgiveness and Related Behaviors (32 works) · Social Psychology (30 works) · Forgiveness (26 works) · Economic Justice (19 works) · Developmental psychology (18 works)