A recent model of collective action distinguishes 2 distinct pathways: an emotional pathway whereby anger in response to injustice motivates action and an efficacy pathway where the belief that issues can be solved collectively increases the likelihood that group members take action (van Zomeren, Spears, Fischer, & Leach, 2004). Research supporting this model has, however, focused entirely on relatively normative actions such as participating in demonstrations. We argue that the relations between emotions, efficacy, and action differ for more extreme, nonnormative actions and propose (a) that nonnormative actions are often driven by a sense of low efficacy and (b) that contempt, which, unlike anger, entails psychological distancing and a lack of reconciliatory intentions, predicts nonnormative action. These ideas were tested in 3 survey studies examining student protests against tuition fees in Germany (N = 332), Indian Muslims' action support in relation to ingroup disadvantage (N = 156), and British Muslims' responses to British foreign policy (N = 466). Results were generally supportive of predictions and indicated that (a) anger was strongly related to normative action but overall unrelated or less strongly related to nonnormative action, (b) contempt was either unrelated or negatively related to normative action but significantly positively predicted nonnormative action, and (c) efficacy was positively related to normative action and negatively related to nonnormative action. The implications of these findings for understanding and dealing with extreme intergroup phenomena such as terrorism are discussed.

Although intergroup contact is one of the most prominent interventions to reduce prejudice, the generalization of contact effects is still a contentious issue. This research further examined the rarely studied secondary transfer effect (STE; Pettigrew, 2009), by which contact with a primary outgroup reduces prejudice toward secondary groups that are not directly involved in the contact. Across 3 cross-sectional studies conducted in Cyprus (N = 1,653), Northern Ireland (N = 1,973), and Texas (N = 275) and 1 longitudinal study conducted in Northern Ireland (N = 411), the present research sought to systematically rule out alternative accounts of the STE and to investigate 2 potential mediating mechanisms (ingroup reappraisal and attitude generalization). Results indicated that, consistent with the STE, contact with a primary outgroup predicts attitudes toward secondary outgroups, over and above contact with the secondary outgroup, socially desirable responding, and prior attitudes. Mediation analyses found strong evidence for attitude generalization but only limited evidence for ingroup reappraisal as an underlying process. Two out of 3 tests of a reverse model, where contact with the secondary outgroup predicts attitudes toward the primary outgroup, provide further evidence for an indirect effect through attitude generalization. Theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed, and directions for future research are identified.

This review addresses three recent developments in the collective action literature. First, we demonstrate that normative and non-normative collective action participation can be predicted by different psychological variables. Second, we show that collective action participation has emotional and identity-related consequences for activists that shape their motivation to engage in future action. Third, we illustrate that members of disadvantaged groups are faced with two dilemmas: the dilemma of alternative ways of identity management and the dilemma of affective loyalties towards the outgroup, both of which present barriers to social change by undermining protest intentions. In the final part of the review, we outline an integrative framework that maps out the dynamic processes between antecedents of, barriers to and outcomes of collective action participation and highlight a number of directions for future research.We have witnessed an upsurge of protest around the world in the last 5 years: popular uprisings across the Middle East fought oppressive regimes, movements across Europe protested against spending cuts, and, more recently, citizens of Hong Kong went onto the streets to demand democratic change. When and why do people engage in protest? And, equally importantly, why do they so often remain passive in the face of injustice, inequality, and oppression? These questions have fascinated social scientists for decades. While there has been extensive research on collective action and social movements in the field of sociology (e.g, Della Porta, 1995; Klandermans, 1997), social psychology has only relatively recently started to add to this literature by unravelling the psychological factors that motivate engagement in protest. This work has already provided important insights into the psychological processes that play a role in protest behaviour by demonstrating the crucial relevance of subjective grievances, justice-related emotions such as anger, a sense of agency and efficacy, and identification with the disadvantaged group as motivators of participation (see van Zomeren, Postmes & Spears, 2008, for a review). The present review builds on this body of work, but aims to extend it in three important ways.First, we note that collective action research in social psychology has focused almost exclusively on relatively moderate forms of action, such as participation in peaceful demonstrations. Protest can, however, include a much wider array of strategies, including more disruptive actions such as sabotage or violence (see Wright, Taylor & Moghaddam, 1990). Our first proposition in this review is that different sets of appraisals and emotional responses underlie support for, and engagement in, more radical forms of collective action.Specifically, we aim to demonstrate that radical action is most likely to be supported when the perceived efficacy of one's group in effecting the desired social change is low, and among individuals who respond to injustices with contempt towards the authorities, rather than anger.Seco...

We assessed evidence for a contextual effect of positive intergroup contact, whereby the effect of intergroup contact between social contexts (the between-level effect) on outgroup prejudice is greater than the effect of individual-level contact within contexts (the within-level effect). Across seven large-scale surveys (five cross-sectional and two longitudinal), using multilevel analyses, we found a reliable contextual effect. This effect was found in multiple countries, operationalizing context at multiple levels (regions, districts, and neighborhoods), and with and without controlling for a range of demographic and context variables. In four studies (three cross-sectional and one longitudinal) we showed that the association between context-level contact and prejudice was largely mediated by more tolerant norms. In social contexts where positive contact with outgroups was more commonplace, norms supported such positive interactions between members of different groups. Thus, positive contact reduces prejudice on a macrolevel, whereby people are influenced by the behavior of others in their social context, not merely on a microscale, via individuals' direct experience of positive contact with outgroup members. These findings reinforce the view that contact has a significant role to play in prejudice reduction, and has great policy potential as a means to improve intergroup relations, because it can simultaneously impact large numbers of people. diversity | trust | social norms | multilevel analysis

Positive intergroup contact has been a guiding framework for research on reducing intergroup tension and for interventions aimed at that goal. We propose that beyond improving attitudes toward the out-group, positive contact affects disadvantaged-group members' perceptions of intergroup inequality in ways that can undermine their support for social change toward equality. In Study 1, participants were assigned to either high- or low-power experimental groups and then brought together to discuss either commonalities between the groups or intergroup differences. Commonality-focused contact, relative to difference-focused contact, produced heightened expectations for fair (i.e., egalitarian) out-group behavior among members of disadvantaged groups. These expectations, however, proved unrealistic when compared against the actions of members of the advantaged groups. Participants in Study 2 were Israeli Arabs (a disadvantaged minority) who reported the amount of positive contact they experienced with Jews. More positive intergroup contact was associated with increased perceptions of Jews as fair, which in turn predicted decreased support for social change. Implications for social change are considered.