| 1. |
- Hellmer, Kahl, et al.
(författare)
-
How Does Preschoolers’ Conformity Relate to Parental Style, Anonymous Sharing, and Obedience?
- 2022
-
Ingår i: International journal of developmental science. - : IOS Press. - 2192-001X .- 2191-7485. ; 15:3-4, s. 49-59
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Children, just like adults, conform to peer testimony when making ostensibly easy decisions. Yet, some are more prone to conform than others and little is known about which factors contribute to this variability. In the current study, we aimed to investigate the reasons for individual differences in conformity by examining potential correlates of experimentally-elicited conformity in a sample of Swedish 3.5-year-olds (N = 55; 56%girls). Specifically, we asked whether conformity was socialized by parents via their parental style and whether conformity is correlated with the behaviors of anonymous sharing or obedience, which might each share a common motivation with conformity. Our data showed that children’s conformity was associated with fathers’, but not mothers’, authoritarian parental style and with anonymous sharing, but not obedience. The findings lend support to the notions that authoritarian parental style encourages conformist behavior, and that conformity is correlated with anonymous sharing behavior.
|
|
| 2. |
- Hellmer, Kahl
(författare)
-
To be right or to be liked? : Correlates of preschoolers’ informational and normative conformity
- 2021
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Humans conform. That is, humans align their behaviors, attitudes, and beliefs with others to learn and adapt. When we are uncertain, naïve, or believe that others know better than us – we can conform for informational reasons and imitate behaviors or ideas observed from the majority of those around us. If the masses are doing something we can suppose that it likely is effective or right. Likewise, when we need to strengthen bonds with others, fear being ostracized, or simply wish to befriend other individuals, we can normatively conform and strategically imitate their behaviors or ideas to signal affiliation outwardly, while still privately retaining our original beliefs. Importantly, although conformity is intrinsic to all human cultures and age-groups, there is also notable inter-individual variability in conformity propensity: Some individuals tend to conform often while others conform very rarely. This applies to both adults and young children. In this thesis I have addressed the variability in children’s conformity by investigating both propensity and motivation using an individual differences perspective. The overarching aim was to identify psychological (personality traits) and psychosocial factors (parents’ personality and parental style), as well as other social behaviors (obedience and altruistic behavior) that can help to explain why some children conform more than others, and importantly, why they differ in their motivation to conform.Using an Asch-style paradigm to elicit public conformity in 3.5-year-olds using adult (Study I) and peer (Studies II and III) confederates, we established individuals’ conformity propensity over eight trials. Additionally, using an eye-tracking task during each trial, we measured what the participant privately held as true after publicly conforming. This measure allowed us to differentiate whether the conformity was informational (believing that the majority’s inaccurate testimony was correct) or normative (knowing that it was not, but conforming for social reasons). The main findings reported in this thesis are (i) the personality trait extroversion has a U-shaped relationship with conformity propensity – low and high scores on this trait are predictive of more conformity to both adults (Study I) and peers (Study III); (ii) when children conform, high extroversion is predictive of doing so for a normative motivation and low extroversion for an informational (Studies I and III); (iii) children with higher conformity propensities are more likely to have displayed altruistic behavior but not obedience (Study II); and (iv) fathers’ authoritarian parental style is associated with their children’s conformity propensity (Study II).
|
|
| 3. |
- Jylhä, Kirsti M., et al.
(författare)
-
Right-Wing Populism and Climate Change Denial : The Roles of Exclusionary and Anti-Egalitarian Preferences, Conservative Ideology, and Antiestablishment Attitudes
- 2020
-
Ingår i: Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy. - : WILEY. - 1529-7489 .- 1530-2415. ; 20:1, s. 315-335
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Populist right-wing politicians and voters tend to dismiss climate change. To investigate possible reasons for this, we tested correlations between climate change denial and variables linked to right-wing populism (Study 1: N = 1,587; Study 2: N = 909). The strongest predictor of climate change denial was an index capturing exclusionary and anti-egalitarian preferences (opposition to, e.g., multiculturalism and feminism), followed by traditional values (Study 1) and Social Dominance Orientation (Study 2). Populist antiestablishment attitudes correlated only weakly with climate change denial, and this correlation vanished when exclusionary and anti-egalitarian preferences were controlled for. Also, the effects of authoritarianism (Study 2) and (low) openness vanished in the full models. Climate change denial did not correlate with (low) agreeableness, which is a personality trait linked to populism. However, both antiestablishment attitudes and climate change denial correlated with pseudoscientific beliefs (e.g., anti-vaccination attitudes) (Study 1). To conclude, we did not find support for a notable linkage between climate change denial and populist antiestablishment attitudes. Thus, when addressing climate change denial, it could be more beneficial to focus on the ideological worldviews that are being protected by denial, such as endorsement of the existing societal power relations, than on the antiestablishment arguments used by some who deny.
|
|
