The impacts of extreme events can intersect with pre-disaster systemic inequalities and deficiencies, exacerbating distress. This paper contributes to the existing literature by exploring the psychosocial processes through which stressors become traumatic during an extreme event. It does so by focusing on how mothers of children and/or adolescents in the United Kingdom experienced the COVID-19 pandemic. First, qualitative interviews (N = 15) showed that participants experienced a cluster of stressors stemming from their workplaces, partners, children's behaviours and homeschooling, which caused a sense of overload and captivity, reducing their quality of life. However, individual, interpersonal and collective forms of coping were reported. Second, quantitative survey data (N = 621) showed that the relationship between stressors and perceived stress was mediated by feelings of overload due to excessive identity-related tasks and caregiving responsibilities. Moreover, community identification was associated with reduced overload and perceived stress. Overall, during extreme events, people can experience distress due to being overloaded by and trapped in particular identities and identity-related tasks, unable to perform other aspects of their social selves. We argue that social psychological analyses can be useful in tracing the complex impacts of extreme events across a range of systems and levels of analysis.

This paper sheds light on how spaces become contested sites for identity construction and negotiation to take place. Applying the Social Representations Approach, a qualitative study of 10 focus group discussions (n = 39), was conducted in Singapore, Malaysia and the UK to explore how, and why racialised identity construction changed in each socio-political context. The study challenged two underlying assumptions in social psychology: (1) that the meaning of the racialised category holds constant across time and space, and (2) there exists a pan-racial identification among Asian identities, for example, which at times allows for racialised categories to be manipulated as variables. We argue that the distinction between the country that the racialised identity originates from, country of birth (or citizenship) for the individual and country that the individual manages the identity in, is important in understanding the changes in the psychology of racialised identities. By taking into consideration the interplay of temporality, space, social relations and social systems, this paper presents a contribution in the form of the concept "politicized psycho-geographies".

The ways people imagine possible futures with artificial intelligence (AI) affects future world-making-how the future is produced through cultural propagation, design, engineering, policy, and social interaction-yet there has been little empirical study of everyday people's expectations for AI futures. We addressed this by analysing two waves (2021 and 2023) of USA nationally representative data from the Artificial Intelligence, Morality, and Sentience (AIMS) survey on the public's forecasts about an imagined future world with widespread AI sentience (total N = 2401). Average responses to six forecasts (exploiting AI labour, treating AI cruelly, using AI research subjects, AI welfare, AI rights advocacy, AI unhappiness reduction) showed mixed expectations for humanity's future with AI. Regressions of these forecasts on demographics such as age, the year the data was collected, individual psychological differences (the tendency to anthropomorphise, mind perception, techno-animist beliefs), and attitudes towards current AI (perceived threat and policy support) found significant effects on all forecasts from mind perception, anthropomorphism, and political orientation, and on five forecasts from techno-animism. The realized future that comes to pass will depend on these dynamic social psychological factors, consequent changes in expectations, and how those expectations shape acts of world-making.

Collective continuity, the perception of the ingroup as an enduring temporal entity, has been linked with ingroup favouritism, negative attitudes and prejudice towards the outgroups. However, previous studies focused mainly on the perceived connection between the past and present of the group. We proposed that the expectation of a strong similarity between the present and future of the national ingroup, future collective continuity (FCC), positively affects present intergroup relations construals. In line with the hypotheses, Study 1 (N = 202) showed a positive relation between FCC and prosocial outgroup beliefs (i.e., foreigner-related). Study 2 (N = 200) suggested that FCC negatively affects prejudice towards immigrants through lower levels of collective angst. Study 3 (N = 250; preregistered) provided experimental evidence that FCC decreased outgroup prejudice and anxiety and increased collective action intentions through collective angst. Furthermore, a moderated mediation model revealed that these effects held only for individuals who identified with their nation more. Our work suggests that believing that the ingroup will not significantly change in the future might make individuals more open towards outgroup members in the present.

Over the last two decades, Social Network Analysis (SNA) has become a standard tool in various social science disciplines. In social psychology, however, the use of SNA methodology remains scarce. This research identifies gaps in SNA use in Social Psychology and offers pathways for its further development. It reviews all empirical papers using SNA published in high-ranking social psychology journals over the last three decades. Findings reveal that SNA has been used across striking diversity of fields and subdomains central to the discipline, confirming its relevance for any field in Social Psychology in which the role of interpersonal or intergroup relationships is central to understand psychological and behavioural outcomes. However, the use of SNA in Social Psychology has been mostly limited to non-experimental and non-longitudinal studies, using student samples and with a focus on basic measurements of network structures such as density and centrality. The contributions of SNA to the understanding of psychosocial mechanisms have therefore remained modest. We propose several strategies by which such gaps can be filled in future research and the full potential of SNA for social psychology realized.

Social psychological research on race and racism has shown that claims about racism are not always accepted or received as valid reports. In this paper, I offer racial epistemics as one mechanism by which race-talk takes place. I examine how ascribing category-bound entitlements to experiential or other knowledge about racism is variously realised and complicated in the production of claims about racism. Through examining news media accounts where Black persons were invited to talk about their experiences of racism in India, I show that despite ascribing a privileged epistemic position to Black persons, recipients (interviewers and other panellists) could make salient epistemic entitlements to commonsense, specialised, or other forms of (racial) knowledge in collaboratively establishing, confirming or correcting, and challenging claims about racism in India. The findings are discussed in relation to the broader understanding of racism in social psychology. The data are in Indian English.

Collective action can be a crucial tool for enabling individuals to combat crime in their communities. In this research, we investigated individuals' intentions to mobilize against organized crime, a particularly impactful form of crime characterized by its exercises of power over territories and communities. We focused on individuals' views and perceptions of state authorities, examining how these views may be linked to intentions for collective mobilization. Using a large dataset with participants from eight countries (N = 2088), we tested two distinct and opposing indirect paths through which perceived state responsiveness may be associated with collective mobilization intentions against organized crime, namely increased collective community efficacy (a Catalyst Indirect Effect) and diminished perceived threat from criminal groups (a Complacency Indirect Effects). Results showed that state responsiveness was associated with stronger collective action intentions through increased collective community efficacy. There was also some evidence of reduced collective action intentions through diminished perceived threat. These findings highlight the complex role of state responsiveness in predicting people's intentions to mobilize against collective problems in their communities. Implications of the findings, limitations and future directions are discussed.

The climate and ecological crisis poses an unprecedented challenge, with scientists playing a critical role in how society understands and responds. This study examined how 27 environmentally concerned scientists from 11 countries construct the future in the context of climate change, applying a critical discursive psychology analysis. The degree to which the future is constructed as predetermined or transformable impacts both the urgency and scope of proposed actions. Along a temporal spectrum from fixed and inevitable to contingent and transformable, scientists drew upon shared discourses of social and ecological collapse. The degree of fixity or openness in scientists' talk about the future shaped the range of arguments available, demonstrating varying levels of argumentative flexibility when framing solutions to climate change. At the fixed end, the future was presented as beyond human intervention, echoing doomist discourse. By contrast, more open framings presented collapse not as inevitable but as transformable through human agency. Here, collapse discourses were presented as warnings, motivating arguments that drew upon a wide array of strategies from collective action to technological innovation. These constructions of the future highlight scientists' role in shaping societal discourse and framing what actions are seen as viable or necessary to address the climate crisis.

Knowledge production on marginalized identities is frequently shaped by epistemic violence, which limits both the scope and methodologies of research. One example of this is the case of Kurdish identity in Turkey, where we find that methodological and epistemic problems are evident particularly in social psychological research. To summarize social psychological studies on Kurdishness, Kurdish identity and conflict in Turkey we've conducted a systematic review that includes a total of 63 studies on topics related to Kurdishness. We utilize qualitative content analysis (Schreier, 2012) to address: (1) whether samples in the studies in our review represent Kurds, (2) which topics the studies mostly focus on, (3) how Kurdish identity and Kurds as a group are conceptualized and (4) how the Kurdish issue is conceptualized. We discuss our findings in light of epistemic violence and methodological nationalism and identify the key gaps in the literature and offer a critical, inclusive understanding of the social psychological studies on Kurdish identity and state violence in Turkey.

Right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) refers to an adherence to conventional values and authorities with the power to penalize groups that are perceived to challenge the cohesion of ingroup norms. Correspondingly, RWA has repeatedly been linked to negative perceptions of minoritized groups, such as refugees or religious minorities. To investigate whether and how sociocultural factors add to and moderate how RWA influences perceptions that minoritized groups pose a threat (i.e. threat perceptions), we examined (a) the value of RWA, religiosity and perceived societal marginalization in predicting these threat perceptions across countries, (b) potential moderating effects of individual- and country-level religiosity and marginalization on the RWA-threat link and (c) the robustness of cross-sectional findings when daily threat perceptions were assessed longitudinally. We used cross-sectional survey data from Germany N = 1896; Study (1) and Europe N = 3227; Study (2) and global cross-sectional and longitudinal daily diary data N = 3154 individuals; N >52,447 assessments; N = 41 countries; Study (3). Our studies point to the significance of contextual conditions and the generalizability of cross-sectional findings to day-to-day assessments of threat perceptions.

In three studies (total N = 622), the effects of threat to control on subsequent moral judgement were examined. After recalling a lack-of-control experience, participants evaluated the morality of a protagonist's decisions in a series of incongruent moral dilemmas. We found that a control-threatening reminder made moral judgements more utilitarian on the deontological-utilitarian dimension, which is consistent with the control motivation theory. However, this effect depended on the type of judgement and the duration of control deprivation. It emerged only when evaluating moral legitimacy, not overall moral acceptability, and only under brief control-threatening situations, not long ones. Thus, control threat made moral reasoning more utilitarian only when factors promoting more careful, exhaustive story processing were at play. Presumably, under these conditions, the non-specific motivation to regain control-by prompting effortful processing-allowed participants to weigh the moral pros and cons before reaching a final judgement.

We propose a new motivational model that integrates self-determination theory (with a focus on basic needs) with social-psychological research on allyship and solidarity to better understand when and why allies may engage in different actions to address social injustice. We theorize that normative (e.g., donations and protesting) and non-normative (e.g., blocking highways and disrupting events) solidarity-based actions are motivated by allies' basic needs (measured at the individual and group levels) as well as their perception of disadvantaged groups' basic needs (measured at the individual and group levels). We tested the model in two cross-sectional studies using two different contexts: English citizens' solidarity (i.e., allies from a high-status group) with Ukrainian refugees and students' solidarity (i.e., allies from a low-status group) with the striking university employees in the United Kingdom (N = 1232). In both studies, we found that the more allies' needs were satisfied, the more likely they were to engage in normative solidarity actions. In contrast, intentions to engage in non-normative solidarity actions were predicted by frustration of allies' needs. Perceptions of disadvantaged group's needs predicted engagement in both normative and non-normative actions. Notably, high-status allies' solidarity was driven by both individual and group-level needs, whilst low-status allies were only motivated by group-level needs.

Critical voices within social psychology have, for some time, emphasized that context matters for understanding psychological phenomena and processes. This special issue examines what a social psychology of context, and in context, can contribute to understanding contemporary geopolitics. We argue that, in examining the interplay between social psychology and contemporary geopolitics, we can understand how geopolitical contexts shape psychological processes and how psychology, in turn, informs our understanding of geopolitical phenomena. There are two thematic strands of the special issue; first, how psychological mechanisms influence perceptions and actions within geopolitical contexts, and second, how geopolitics shapes psychology as a discipline, including its theoretical frameworks and power dynamics. Papers examine three dimensions within which psychology and geopolitics meet-the temporal, spatial and embodied-representing history, geography and social relations, while emphasizing their interconnectedness. Drawing on critical geopolitics and social psychology, this introduction underscores the constructed, contested and political nature of time and space. By interlinking historical and social meaning with spatialization, this issue offers a deeper understanding of how individuals, groups and nations create and contest the psychological and geopolitical landscapes that shape contemporary life. The contributions highlight both the opportunities and challenges for social psychology in engaging with these critical intersections.

We examined the relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and endorsement of honour. We studied the SES-honour link in 5 studies (N = 13,635) with participants recruited in different world regions (the Mediterranean and MENA, East Asian, South-East Asian, and Anglo-Western regions) using measures that tap into various different facets of honour. Findings from these studies revealed that individuals who subjectively perceived themselves as belonging to a higher (vs. lower) SES endorsed various facets of honour more strongly (i.e. defence of family honour values and concerns, self-promotion and retaliation values, masculine honour beliefs, emphasis on personal and family social image, the so-called street code). We discuss implications of these findings for the cultural dynamics linked to SES.

The burgeoning progress of cutting-edge technology paradoxically evokes nostalgia. How does this emotion influence responses to innovative technology, such as Artificial Intelligence (AI)? We hypothesized that two pathways operate concurrently. First, by enhancing connection with significant others, nostalgia constitutes a psychological resource that supports exploration of technological innovation, thereby promoting positive responses to AI. Second, by reinforcing scepticism toward change, nostalgia heightens uncertainty about innovative technology, thereby fostering negative responses to AI. Three preregistered experiments, testing participants (ΣN = 1397) across cultures (China, UK, USA), supported the two pathways. Nostalgia influenced responses to ChatGPT via two opposing serial pathways (Experiment 1). Further, social connectedness bolstered favourable responses to AI avatars via increased technology exploration (Experiment 2), whereas scepticism about change reduced favourable responses to companion robots via increased technology uncertainty (Experiment 3). This dualistic role of nostalgia can be harnessed to sustain new technology or instill caution for its risks.

Previous research on the link between temperature and prosociality has produced mixed findings. A recent meta-analysis focusing on laboratory-based research concluded that the effect was null, a conclusion that was subject to low ecological validity. This paper complements the discussion by investigating the link between ambient temperature and three indicators of real-life prosociality in 164 regions over 14 years. The between-regional comparison probes the relationship over a wide range of thermal conditions, whereas the within-regional temporal comparison draws this literature to the real-life problem of global warming. Bayesian analysis indicates that temperature is linked to helping strangers, but not volunteerism or charity donation. Hotter regions have more helping respondents than colder regions, and as a region warms, it also records more helping respondents. The positive link between temperature and helping is in line with social thermoregulation theory, but it is also subject to alternative explanations from a cultural perspective and sociological perspective. We conclude that it is unrealistic to expect temperature to have the same effect on all prosocial acts without considering contextual factors and the underlying mechanisms. Our findings call for a nuanced view concerning the effect of temperature on prosociality, which awaits verification by rigorous research designs.

This article reports the development and validation of the Episodic Empowerment Scale (EES): A manipulation check designed to measure a momentary psychological state. In Study 1, participants (n = 125) completed a selection of candidate items after being exposed to a low- or high-power manipulation. Exploratory factor analysis was used to reduce the number of items to a brief five-item measure. We then examined the validity, reliability, and stability of the EES. Study 2 (n = 143) compared the target sensitivity of the EES to a widely used measure of power. In Study 3 (n = 129), we investigated the discriminant content validity of the EES by testing its sensitivity to a non-target manipulation: positive and negative affect. Finally, in a large-scale replication, Study 4 (n = 479) established the measurement invariance of the EES across experimental conditions and the interaction between conditions and gender as well as replicating the findings from Study 1. Our results indicate that the EES is a brief, valid, and sensitive manipulation check. Findings are discussed within the broader context of validating self-report manipulation checks and the importance of employing robust psychometric techniques in experimental social psychology.

The under-reporting of family violence is a global problem. Multiple barriers to help-seeking have been identified, including some associated with social identities like race, age and gender. This discursive psychology study examines identity and help-seeking in social interaction. We analysed 200 calls classified by police call-takers as family harm using conversation analysis and membership categorization analysis. We found that callers oriented to a locally generated identity category 'the one who called police' as problematic. Callers sought anonymity or proposed cover stories to avoid being identified by others. Anonymity raised practical problems for recording callers' names and cover stories raised questions about the legitimacy of alternative accounts for police contact. We found callers' concerns with being identified create a dilemma produced through competing moral judgements tied to coexisting institutional and relational identity categories. Participants display understandings that calling the police may be the right thing to do as a help-seeker, but the wrong thing to do as a friend or family member. Our findings reveal how a locally generated identity category was observable as a force shaping help-seeking in real-time high-stakes encounters.

This paper examines the geopolitical implications of knowledge production in psychology through two studies that respond to the growing body of work on the 'Decolonisation of Knowledge' and the 'Decolonisation of Psychology' over the past two decades. By adopting a constructivist approach, particularly through the lens of Social Representation Theory (SRT), these studies explore the ways in which geopolitical contexts shape decolonial activism within psychological and scientific discourse. The first study sheds light on the lexical divergences in the construction of knowledge within the domains of psychology. We reviewed 300 article abstracts related to decolonial studies using lexicometric analysis based on the Reinhart method (IraMuTeq). Four clusters were identified: Educational Reform, Historical Temporalities, Social Actors, and Epistemological Discourse. These clusters suggest differences in knowledge production within different geopolitical localities. The second study explores these variations by immersing itself in the perspectives and representations articulated by decolonial scholars. The second study is conducted using 12 semi-structured interviews with academics actively engaged in decolonial efforts. The aim of the two studies is to demonstrate regional variations in decolonial discourse and highlight the ongoing influence of geopolitical factors on scientific inquiry.

Hope is a future-oriented emotion that attunes people to the possibility of positive change, and thus could potentially catalyse societal engagement with climate change. A recent meta-analysis suggests that the relationship between hope and climate action is most robust when the target of hope is climate engagement (i.e. action hope) rather than climate change more broadly. Yet, this previous meta-analysis also suggests that fostering action hope and climate engagement may be challenging via typical short media messages used in many studies. Here we consider an alternative source of action hope: receiving social support. Two studies tested whether social support motivates climate action via increased action hope. Study 1 (correlational online survey, pre-registered, N = 887) demonstrates that, as predicted, both instrumental and emotional support predict intentions to take civic action and these effects are explained by action hope. Study 2 (field study, N = 84, N = 520) mostly replicates and extends these findings in a field setting, demonstrating that social support recipients' action hope is also associated with social support reported by support providers (here, environmental educators) and that this action hope again explains a possible relationship between social support and climate engagement.

Degrowth-oriented climate change mitigation policies offer inspiring possibilities for future societies. However, they require radical change to individual and collective behaviours; and research has not yet fully addressed how people may anticipate future loss and threat when confronted with such policies. This study proposes a twofold examination of anticipated reactions to pro-environmental degrowth-oriented minority influence. First, we conducted a qualitative study of 21 semi-structured interviews. Both thematic analysis and consensual approach methodologies were adopted to explore emerging trends in the perception of a minority call to reduce human overpopulation, consumption of natural resources, and infrastructural incursions into nature. Results revealed three recurring themes: loss of individual freedom, fear of extremism, and loss of comfort. Second, a quantitative study (N = 488) followed up these results by testing the hypothesis that anticipated loss would be associated to a gendered perception of threat. In line with our conjecture regarding the relationship between policy change, status quo preservation, and gender, moderation analysis showed that men reported more threat than women, the more perceptions of degrowth-oriented policies were anticipated as a loss. Implications for a future-forming approach of research and policy making are discussed considering perceiving radical pro-environmental change as a threatening loss.