AI Article Synopsis
- Social vigilantism (SV) is a personality trait where individuals push their "superior" beliefs on others, aiming to correct perceived ignorance.
- In three studies, SV was linked to stronger feelings of belief superiority, regardless of whether others shared similar views or not, and showed a notable resistance to being persuaded.
- The findings indicate that SV is a significant factor in understanding how people express their beliefs and resist changing them, beyond other psychological traits previously studied.
Article Abstract
Social vigilantism (SV) is an enduring individual difference that assesses the tendency of individuals to impress and propagate their "superior" beliefs onto others to correct others' more "ignorant" opinions. After establishing a reliable measure of SV, three studies showed that SV was associated with greater expressions of belief superiority (whether reacting to others holding dissimilar or similar beliefs) and greater resistance to persuasion (via increased rates of counterarguing and greater attitude stability after persuasion appeals) even after controlling for relevant individual differences (narcissism, dogmatism, psychological reactance, and need for cognition), as well as attitude importance and extremity. Thus, SV predicts expressions of belief superiority and resistance to persuasion above and beyond characteristics of the attitude and individual difference variables previously studied in the attitude literature. SV is a meaningful construct in increasing the understanding of persuasion, attitude resistance, and attitude dissemination that can be applied in a variety of psychological domains.
Download full-text PDF |
Source |
|---|---|
| http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0146167209346170 | DOI Listing |
Publication Analysis
Top Keywords
Similar Publications
Want AI Summaries of new PubMed Abstracts delivered to your In-box?
Enter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!