A world together: Global citizen identification as a basis for prosociality in the face of COVID-19

Turner, Rhiannon N.; Jetten, Jolanda; Steffens, Niklas K.; Álvarez, Belén García; Bentley, Sarah V.; Casara, Bruno Gabriel Salvador; Crimston, Charlie R.; Ionescu, Octavia; Krug, Henning; Selvanathan, Hema Preya; Tanjitpiyanond, Porntida; Wibisono, Susilo; Chen, Shuting; Wang, Jiajun; Zhang, Xin; Sun, Shijin

doi:10.1177/13684302211051619

Cited by 6 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 62 publications

(81 reference statements)

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“…The study also replicated previous findings (e.g., Barragan et al, 2021Barragan & Meltzoff, 2023Wang et al, 2023) about the predictive power…”

Section: Asupporting

confidence: 89%

Pandemics past: Collective memories for a global community?

Bikmen

2023

Group Processes & Intergroup Relations

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Collective memories support collective identities and provide lessons for group members to manage present challenges. Three surveys (total N = 1,137) tested whether U.S. nationals who strongly identify with all humanity (IWAH) were more interested in learning about pandemics in history as events that affected the whole world (Study 1) and more knowledgeable about past pandemics (Studies 2a and 2b). Stronger IWAH predicted greater interest in learning about past pandemics, but not greater knowledge of these events. Further, while IWAH was a consistent predictor of support for global cooperation for pandemic preparedness and, to a lesser extent, of compliance with COVID-19 health-protective behaviors, knowledge of past pandemics contributed modestly to these outcomes. These findings suggest that while past pandemics have the potential to become global memories, they are not yet actual global memories that inform a sense of global human identity and offer courses of action for the present.

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“…The study also replicated previous findings (e.g., Barragan et al, 2021Barragan & Meltzoff, 2023Wang et al, 2023) about the predictive power…”

Section: Asupporting

confidence: 89%

Pandemics past: Collective memories for a global community?

Bikmen

2023

Group Processes & Intergroup Relations

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“…Psychology plays a considerable role in human health ( Taylor et al, 1997 ; Fredrickson, 2001 ), and the present research shows peoples’ identification with all humanity is key to predicting their willingness to contribute to the health of others . That is, while much of social and personality psychology examines the nature and course of prosocial interactions within families, cultures, and societies ( Keltner et al, 2014 ), the work on identification with all humanity is consistently suggesting that there is a portion of the population, across multiple cultures, that strives for showing concern not only for their kin, community, or country, but for all humans ( McFarland and Hornsby, 2015 ; McFarland et al, 2019 ; Sparkman and Hamer, 2020 ; Barragan et al, 2021 ; Deng, 2021 ; Hamer et al, 2021 ; Wang et al, 2021 ; Feng et al, 2022 ; Zagefka, 2022 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Prosociality and health: Identification with all humanity is a replicable predictor of prosocial motivation for health behaviors

Barragan

Meltzoff

2023

Front. Psychol.

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The acute phase of the COVID-19 pandemic may have passed, but the pandemic remains a major worldwide health concern that demands continued vigilance. Are there individual differences that predict the motivation to continue to wear masks and to create physical distance in public? Previous research conducted early in the pandemic had suggested that a particular social identity—identification with all humanity—is one underlying factor that contributes to people’s cooperation with health behavior guidelines. This highlights that the pandemic is not only an issue to be tackled with the tools of immunology and epidemiology. It also requires the tools from psychology—to measure the representations people have about themselves and others and how these representations drive values and decisions related to health. Here we report work on U.S. respondents that examined whether individuals’ level of identification with all humanity predicts their prosocial health behaviors aimed at mitigating the spread of COVID-19. In 3 convergent studies (total N = 1,580), we find that identification with all humanity predicted the prosocial motivation to wear masks and to engage in physical distancing when in public without a mask. The results were obtained while controlling for a host of covariates, including demographics, educational attainment, and Big Five personality dimensions. We find that some people have a marked drive to care for the health of strangers, which is significantly linked to their concern for all humanity rather than being restricted to their care for their community or country. Discussion focuses on this social identification with humanity and its enduring, replicable role in predicting the motivation to engage in prosocial health behaviors. We note key implications for theories in social and developmental psychology as well as for research that may lead to practical applications for lessening the human toll of the current and future pandemics.

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“…Prior research (Barragan et al, 2021; Marchlewska et al, 2022; Wang et al, 2021) has not yet examined how distinct factors of maximally inclusive identities (e.g., identification with all humanity, global identification) predict health-related behaviors during COVID-19. Thus, Goal 2 of the present research was to take a more granular look at associations with the “bond” and “concern” factors of identification with all humanity.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Indeed, identification with a maximally inclusive ingroup (e.g., identification with all humanity, global identification) predicted greater concern over the AIDS crisis (McFarland, 2017) and the spread of dangerous diseases such as SARS and the Avian flu (Buchan et al, 2011). Recent research has also shown identification at the most inclusive level uniquely predicts personal, health-related behaviors that reduce the spread of COVID-19 (Barragan et al, 2021; Marchlewska et al, 2022; Wang et al, 2021) or helping behaviors toward others during the COVID-19 pandemic (Deng, 2021; Zagefka, 2021).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Identification with humanity and health-related behaviors during COVID-19

Sparkman

2022

Group Processes & Intergroup Relations

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This research takes a maximally inclusive social identity approach to COVID-19 and examines whether the “bond” and “concern” factors of identification with humanity: (1) explain additional variance in health-related behaviors—above and beyond relevant covariates; (2) are uniquely associated with health-related behaviors; and (3) were more strongly associated with health-related behaviors when COVID-19 cases were high. Results ( N = 324) suggest the bond and concern factors explained significantly more variance in social distancing, social influencing, overbuying, and marginally more variance in mask wearing. Bond with all humanity uniquely predicted more mask wearing, more social influencing, less social distancing, and more overbuying, and concern for all humanity uniquely predicted more social distancing and less overbuying. However, COVID-19 cases did not consistently moderate associations with health-related behaviors. Overall, identification with humanity has an important role in—and the bond and concern factors have distinct associations with—health-related behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic.

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A world together: Global citizen identification as a basis for prosociality in the face of COVID-19

Cited by 6 publications

References 62 publications

Pandemics past: Collective memories for a global community?

Pandemics past: Collective memories for a global community?

Prosociality and health: Identification with all humanity is a replicable predictor of prosocial motivation for health behaviors

Identification with humanity and health-related behaviors during COVID-19

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