Papers by Theofilos Gkinopoulos
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected all domains of human life, including the economic and social f... more The COVID-19 pandemic has affected all domains of human life, including the economic and social fabric of societies. One of the central strategies for managing public health throughout the pandemic has been through persuasive messaging and collective behavior change. To help scholars better understand the social and moral psychology behind public health behavior, we present a dataset comprising of 51,404 individuals from 69 countries. This dataset was collected for the International Collaboration on Social Moral Psychology of COVID-19 project (ICSMP COVID-19). This social science survey invited participants around the world to complete a series of individual differences and public health attitudes about COVID-19 during an early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic (between April and June 2020). The survey included seven broad categories of questions: COVID-19 beliefs and compliance behaviours; identity and social attitudes; ideology; health and well-being; moral beliefs and motivation; pe...
M. H. Bowker & A. Buzby (Eds.) (in preparation). Getting lost: Psycho-political withdrawal in the covidian era., 2022
COVID-19 pandemic had a profound negative impact on people’s personal and social life. In this ch... more COVID-19 pandemic had a profound negative impact on people’s personal and social life. In this chapter, after some conceptual clarifications, we provide insights into the effects of ostracism on people’s well-being as individuals, partners, and group members. Specifically, we explore (a) individual- and personality-based risk factors of ostracism (intrapersonal level); (b) deprivation of social touch, disruption of empathy and social stigmatization in interpersonal relations (interpersonal level); and (c) disruption of social identity, social stigmatization and rise in prejudiced, discriminatory, and xenophobic tendencies within groups (intergroup level). The contribution of this chapter lies in proposing an interplay among intrapersonal, interpersonal, and intergroup dimensions of identity, that is, a multi-level conceptualization of ostracism during the covidian era. By integrating theoretical arguments and research findings, we support the view that personal identity commitment and identification with social groups have similar roots, both based on the individual’s need to formulate meaningful connections to the world and, thus, cope with as well as prevent ostracism. The implications of the interplay between personal and social identity for the measurement of ostracism are also discussed. Next, strategies for tackling ostracism during the pandemic or similar widespread crises are proposed. Finally, avenues for future research are suggested.
Journal of Social and Political Psychology, 2022
Political leaders tend to apologize for wrongdoings. This study focuses on a disaster that occurr... more Political leaders tend to apologize for wrongdoings. This study focuses on a disaster that occurred on July 2018 in east Attica, Greece, where wildfires destroyed houses and left dozens of people dead. Two pilot studies and one main study were conducted testing perceptions of apology as sincere, perceived trust, positive emotional climate and participants' support towards the governmental policies. Participants (N = 180 for the two pilot studies, N = 222 for the main study) were recruited from the disaster zone of east Attica. The focus is on two key forms of political apology, a self or offender-focused apology and a self-other or victim-focused apology. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the conditions equivalent to each of the two forms of apology, that is either in a victim-focused apology condition or an offender-focused apology, or a control condition, where a neutral image was shown to participants. Results showed a positive association between victim-focused apology, compared to offender-focused apology, and political support towards the government via increased perceived sincerity, trust and positive emotional climate. Political and psychological implications related to different forms of public apologies are discussed.
PLoS ONE, 2022
Believing in conspiracy theories is a major problem, especially in the face of a pandemic, as the... more Believing in conspiracy theories is a major problem, especially in the face of a pandemic, as these constitute a significant obstacle to public health policies, like the use of masks and vaccination. Indeed, during the COVID-19 pandemic, several ungrounded explanations regarding the origin of the virus or the effects of vaccinations have been rising, leading to vaccination hesitancy or refusal which poses as a threat to public health. Recent studies have shown that in the core of conspiracy theories lies a moral evaluation component; one that triggers a moral reasoning which reinforces the conspiracy itself. To gain a better understanding of how conspiracy beliefs about COVID-19 affect public health containment behaviors and policy support via morality-relevant variables, we analysed comprehensive data from the International Collaboration on the Social & Moral Psychology (ICSMP) of COVID-19, consisting of 49.965 participants across 67 countries. We particularly explored the mediating role of two levels of morality: individual and group-based morality. Results show that believing in conspiracy theories reduces adoption of containment health-related behaviors and policy support of public health measures, but moral identity and morality-as-cooperation significantly mediate this relationship. This means that beliefs in conspiracy theories do not simply constitute antecedents of cognitive biases or failures, nor maladaptive behaviors based on personality traits, but are morally infused and should be dealt as such. Based on our findings, we further discuss the psychological, moral, and political implications of endorsement of conspiracy theories in the era of the pandemic.
PNAS Nexus, 2022
At the beginning of 2020, COVID-19 became a global problem. Despite all the efforts to emphasize ... more At the beginning of 2020, COVID-19 became a global problem. Despite all the efforts to emphasize the relevance of preventive measures, not everyone adhered to them. Thus, learning more about the characteristics determining attitudinal and behavioral responses to the pandemic is crucial to improving future interventions. In this study, we applied machine learning on the multinational data collected by the International Collaboration on the Social and Moral Psychology of COVID-19 (N = 51,404) to test the predictive efficacy of constructs from social, moral, cognitive, and personality psychology, as well as socio-demographic factors, in the attitudinal and behavioral responses to the pandemic. The results point to several valuable insights. Internalized moral identity provided the most consistent predictive contribution—individuals perceiving moral traits as central to their self-concept reported higher adherence to preventive measures. Similar results were found for morality as cooperation, symbolized moral identity, self-control, open-mindedness, and collective narcissism, while the inverse relationship was evident for the endorsement of conspiracy theories. However, we also found a non-neglible variability in the explained variance and predictive contributions with respect to macro-level factors such as the pandemic stage or cultural region. Overall, the results underscore the importance of morality-related and contextual factors in understanding adherence to public health recommendations during the pandemic.
Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 2022
Conspiracy theories concern milestone events, mobilizing various explanations. However, there is ... more Conspiracy theories concern milestone events, mobilizing various explanations. However, there is still emerging research on how conspiracy beliefs mobilize normative and nonnormative collective action, as well as political engagement and what the emotional underpinnings of such effects are. We conducted two
In this paper, we delineate the connection between history, social identity and populism, applyin... more In this paper, we delineate the connection between history, social identity and populism, applying to populist leadership. We develop an argument of the use of history by populist leaders to politically mobilize and manage of social identities. We draw on social identity approach and its connection with populism. We introduce history as a political tool for populist leaders. We bring specific historical examples from Greece and Poland to make a case for a particular narrative that populist leaders communicate.. We present explanations offered in populist history such as belief in ‘good and evil’ and historical analogies. Finally, we present methods of spreading historical narratives by populist leaders, emphasizing on censorship, denial, museums and commemorations. We conclude by arguing for populist leadership as a reflection of contemporary history with leaders as history makers and consumers. We identify some key questions to enhance our understanding of the historical component ...
Group Processes & Intergroup Relations
Conspiracy beliefs constitute a propensity to attribute major events to powerful agents acting ag... more Conspiracy beliefs constitute a propensity to attribute major events to powerful agents acting against less powerful “victims”. In this article we test whether collective victimhood facilitates conspiracy thinking. Study 1 showed that perceived group victimhood is associated with generic and group-specific conspiracy beliefs, but only for individuals who identify highly with their ingroup. Study 2 employed an experimental design to show that experimentally increased group victimhood leads to increased endorsement of conspiracy beliefs among high ingroup identifiers, but decreases endorsement of conspiracy beliefs among low identifiers. This effect was mediated by lack of trust towards outgroup members. Study 3 sought to replicate Study 2 in a different socio-political context. While Study 3 did not directly support the relationship between victimhood, group identification and conspiracy beliefs, an integrated meta-analysis of all three studies provides evidence for a significant int...
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is a devastating global health crisis. Without a vaccine or effecti... more The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is a devastating global health crisis. Without a vaccine or effective medication, the best hope for mitigating virus transmission is collective behavior change and support for public health interventions (e.g., physical distancing, physical hygiene, and endorsement of health policies). In a large-scale international collaboration (N = 46,450 across 67 countries), we investigated why people adopted public health behaviors and endorsed public policy interventions (e.g., closing bars and restaurants) during the early stages of the pandemic (April-May, 2020). Results revealed that respondents who identified more strongly with their nation consistently reported engagement in public health behaviors and greater support for public health policies. We also found a small effect of political orientation, indicating that left-wing respondents were more likely to report public health behaviors and support for public health measures than right-wing respondents. We d...
PlosOne, 2021
The worldwide spread of a new coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) since December 2019 has posed a severe thr... more The worldwide spread of a new coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) since December 2019 has posed a severe threat to individuals’ well-being. While the world at large is waiting that the released vaccines immunize most citizens, public health experts suggest that, in the meantime, it is only through behavior change that the spread of COVID-19 can be controlled. Importantly, the required behaviors are aimed not only at safeguarding one’s own health. Instead, individuals are asked to adapt their behaviors to protect the community at large. This raises the question of which social concerns and moral principles make people willing to do so. We considered in 23 countries (N = 6948) individuals’ willingness to engage in prescribed and discretionary behaviors, as well as country-level and individual-level factors that might drive such behavioral intentions. Results from multilevel multiple regressions, with country as the nesting variable, showed that publicized number of infections were not significantly related to individual intentions to comply with the prescribed measures and intentions to engage in discretionary prosocial behaviors. Instead, psychological differences in terms of trust in government, citizens, and in particular toward science predicted individuals’ behavioral intentions across countries. The more people endorsed moral principles of fairness and care (vs. loyalty and authority), the more they were inclined to report trust in science, which, in turn, statistically predicted prescribed and discretionary behavioral intentions. Results have implications for the type of intervention and public communication strategies that should be most effective to induce the behavioral changes that are needed to control the COVID-19 outbreak.
Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, 2020
Conspiracy beliefs constitute a propensity to attribute major events to powerful agents acting ag... more Conspiracy beliefs constitute a propensity to attribute major events to powerful agents acting against
less powerful “victims”. In this article we test whether collective victimhood facilitates conspiracy
thinking. Study 1 showed that perceived group victimhood is associated with generic and group-specific
conspiracy beliefs, but only for individuals who identify highly with their ingroup. Study 2 employed
an experimental design to show that experimentally increased group victimhood leads to increased
endorsement of conspiracy beliefs among high ingroup identifiers, but decreases endorsement of
conspiracy beliefs among low identifiers. This effect was mediated by lack of trust towards outgroup
members. Study 3 sought to replicate Study 2 in a different socio-political context. While Study 3
did not directly support the relationship between victimhood, group identification and conspiracy
beliefs, an integrated meta-analysis of all three studies provides evidence for a significant interaction of
victimhood and group identification in predicting conspiracy beliefs.
Journal of Social and Political Psychology, 2020
This study analyses quantitatively the content of thirty-nine political speeches made by politica... more This study analyses quantitatively the content of thirty-nine political speeches made by political leaders of three political parties-New Democracy, Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) and Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA)-of different status represented in the Greek parliament. The leaders of these parties release annual commemorative speeches of the restoration of Greek democracy on 24th July 1974. The focus of this study is on longitudinally analysing the content of commemorative speeches, looking at how political leaders communicate the historical event, by quantifying through a content analysis various forms of ingroups and outgroups in their annual commemorations. Such constructions were ventured during a period of 13 years, from 2004 to 2016, before and during the break out of financial crisis in 2010. Longitudinal quantitative content analysis identified differences in the use of we-referencing and they-referencing language, varying per status of parties and context of release of commemorative speeches. I view commemorative speeches as a non-neutral history-related business that requires mobilisation of audiences in different ways and different contexts. Implications of commemorating the historical past across time as institutional identity practice are discussed.
In this comment, I focus on the integration of memories and human rights. The claim for the "self... more In this comment, I focus on the integration of memories and human rights. The claim for the "self-evident" declares the claim for human rights not only of minorities, or oppressed and forgotten groups but, more broadly, of the self and different others. I consider human rights as they emerge from the content of intergenerational nostalgic memories and are reflected on the right to remember, the right to forget, the right to long for the past, and the right to life. I give a brief account of studies on intergenerational nostalgic memories and I argue for remembering processes as a fundamental human right. Finally, I discuss theoretical implications of integrating memory studies and human rights debates. This article attempts to delineate the link between remembering nostalgic events across the lifespan and human rights through the analytic prism of social representations. I consider the fact that despite few exceptions (see, e.g., Psaltis, 2016), memory studies, in general, tend to remain largely separate from debates on human rights (Huyssen, 2011). To this end, I briefly introduce the background on intergenerational remembering of nostalgic events, establishing a reciprocal relation between remembering such events and the human rights perspective from which I approach the remembering process. In integrating memory and human rights, the universalism of human rights is translated into particular subjective experiences of episodes revealed in participants' reports, to allow a revisiting of universal needs and rights of individuals and groups as memory agents.
Europe's Journal of Psychology, 2019
Collective traumas may often lead to deep societal divides and internal conflicts. In this articl... more Collective traumas may often lead to deep societal divides and internal conflicts. In this article, we propose that conspiracy theories
emerging in response to victimizing events may play a key role in the breakdown of social cohesion. We performed a nationally
representative survey in Poland (N = 965) two years after the Smoleńsk airplane crash in which the Polish president was killed, together
with 95 political officials and high-ranking military officers. The survey found that people endorsing conspiratorial accounts of the Smoleńsk
catastrophe preferred to distance themselves from conspiracy non-believers, while skeptics preferred greater distance to conspiracy
believers. We also examined the role of people’s belief in the uniqueness of in-group historical suffering as an important antecedent of both
conspiracy thinking and hostility towards outgroups (conspiracy believers and non-believers).
This article adopts a pragmatic-communicative approach, derived from Gregory Bateson's cybernetic... more This article adopts a pragmatic-communicative approach, derived from Gregory Bateson's cybernetic theory, to the Greek Referendum Vote of 2015. Applying this approach, we interpret the Referendum as a double-bind situation. Our research question is twofold: (1) How do potential Greek voters discursively construct the Referendum? (2) How do they respond to the communicative situation posed? A total of 124 written narratives, " Letters from the Future, " written by 99 participants, were collected during the days prior to the vote. Their letters focused on a desired future situation after a YES or a NO vote outcome. Qualitative analysis showed how the letters were used to appropriate the Referendum query in a unique and deeply personalized manner. Moreover, we identified four types of responses to the ambivalent query: confirmation, rejection, disconfirmation, and meta-communication. These responses are indicative of the psychological and emotional burden posed by the query and of ways people responded to the query. In conclusion, we reflect on the importance of recognizing the psychological dimension of the vote, the role of narratives from the future for personal and social transformation, and the wider relevance of the proposed future-making, pragmatic approach to other Referendum situations.
This study analyses the discourse of statements of the leaders of two Greek political parties com... more This study analyses the discourse of statements of the leaders of two Greek political parties commemorating the restoration of Greek democracy on 24 July 1974; the ruling party New Democracy and the opposition, Coalition of the Radical Left. We focus on how these leaders act as entrepreneurs of their identities by constructing their ingroups in broad or narrow terms and their outgroups in vague or specific terms. These constructions were ventured during a period of relative political stability (2008) and instability (2012), and we focus on how ingroup prototypes and group boundaries are narrated across Greece's past, present and future in ambiguous or concrete terms. The study aligns the social identity approach to political leadership with studies on political discourse and 'the rhetoric of we'. We view commemorative statements as historical charters and respond to calls for discourse analysis to take greater account of historical context. The findings suggest concrete hypotheses about how leaders with different amounts of political support might define, as identity entrepreneurs, who 'we' are, and who 'we' are not in democratic contexts marked by stability or crisis. In a recent study of identity entrepreneurship, Reicher and Haslam (2017) examined how Donald Trump's political success was enabled by his construction of himself as prototypical of the 'ordinary American' (p. 28). Identity entrepreneurship describes how leaders' regrouping of diverse communities into a single overarching group, and frame their political projects as the instantiation of that group's norms and the leader as the prototypical group member (Condor, Tileaga, & Billig, 2013; Haslam, Reicher, & Platow, 2011; Reicher & Hopkins, 2001). But political legitimacy sometimes requires a leader to be seen by their followers as also something more than average. This study examines the question of when leaders strive to appear akin to the people that they enjoin to follow them, and when they strike to position themselves beyond those people. To this end, our study examines variation in political leaders' rhetorical accomplishment of identity entrepreneurship in different macropolitical context across time periods. We examine this thesis empirically through a discourse analysis of modern Greek political leaders' commemorative statements of the restoration of democracy in 1974. Group history provides an important resource with which leaders can broker their legitimacy as political representatives in democracies and other societies (Liu & Hilton, 2005). By constructing group narratives, political leaders align collective action with the
In the current issue of JISS, we discuss different forms of human thought related to nostalgia, r... more In the current issue of JISS, we discuss different forms of human thought related to nostalgia, replying to Luri Conceicao's commentary (2017; see this present issue of JISS). With regard to the distinction between normal and pathological nostalgia, we argue for a socio-psychological approach to the construction of thought as it has been evolved over the last sixty years. We base our dialogue on the theories of social representations, social memory/ oblivion and cognitive polyphasia. Our goal is to bring into the discussion an alternative view of the same phenomena particularly concerning traditional distinctions that reproduce dominant modes of thought and action.
The purpose of this study was to examine the content of autobiographical nostalgic memories, the ... more The purpose of this study was to examine the content of autobiographical nostalgic memories, the reasons for their recollection and the elicited emotions. Furthermore, this study aimed to show how specific groups generate different representations of nostalgic memories. A total of 244 men and women (young, adults and older people) participated in the study by answering open-ended and closed-ended questions about autobiographical nostalgia. Findings showed that nostalgic experiences related to significant “others”, life periods, leisure, places, and the loss of loved persons. The reasons of nostalgia were associated with good memories and pleasant times, with the desire for revival of the past, carefreeness, but also with the need to cope with loss, death and missed situations. Nostalgia also appeared to be related to both positive and negative emotions. Variations were found across generations. Older people seemed to be more prone to nostalgia and communicated their nostalgic experiences more often than younger individuals. Older people anchored their nostalgia in significant “others” who have passed away, while younger people turned to important personal life periods and leisure activities. Gender differences were detected within older generations. Adult and older aged females were more prone to nostalgia. They were sensitive in absence and in death of family members (parents, grandparents, spouses) experiencing bitter sweet emotions.
Our aim here is to delineate the connection between selective remembering and selective forgettin... more Our aim here is to delineate the connection between selective remembering and selective forgetting as it applies to lay historians listening to selective recountings of history. How does what a speaker remembers about a nation’s past shape what is forgotten about the nation’s past for the listener? To address this question, we will discuss psychological research demonstrating the mnemonic consequences of this selectivity with an emphasis on retrieval-induced forgetting within social settings. In particular, we highlight how selectively remembering nationally relevant, historical events may induce forgetting of related historical information for the listener and this forgetting may not only have important implications for individual and national identities but said identities may influence both what is remembered and forgotten. We end with some concluding thoughts and areas of future research.
The present study explores how the leaders of two political parties, the party in power New Democ... more The present study explores how the leaders of two political parties, the party in power New Democracy (ND) and one of the parties in opposition SYRIZA, depict ingroups and outgroups using a past, present or future account, when representing their group identities. It focuses on commemorative statements made by political leaders on the anniversaries of the restoration of the Greek democracy in 1974. Statements from five different years are analysed: 2004 (the year when Greece hosted the Olympic Games and values of democracy were associated with the Olympic ideals), 2006, 2008, 2012, and 2014 (two of the years of economic crisis). Analysis concerns the rhetorical framing of the restoration of democracy by leaders, focusing on the use of past, present or future account in group representations. Findings identified three key issues around which political leaders shape their temporal account: temporal slippage from past categories to the current political parties versus horizontal comradeship between them, reflections on ingroup history versus expected future outcomes, denial of spatiotemporal co-existence of competing groups versus ongoing co-existence between ingroups and outgroups across time in the political landscape. Findings are discussed under the light of social identity theory and the consideration of different temporal accounts as identity maintenance strategies.
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Papers by Theofilos Gkinopoulos
less powerful “victims”. In this article we test whether collective victimhood facilitates conspiracy
thinking. Study 1 showed that perceived group victimhood is associated with generic and group-specific
conspiracy beliefs, but only for individuals who identify highly with their ingroup. Study 2 employed
an experimental design to show that experimentally increased group victimhood leads to increased
endorsement of conspiracy beliefs among high ingroup identifiers, but decreases endorsement of
conspiracy beliefs among low identifiers. This effect was mediated by lack of trust towards outgroup
members. Study 3 sought to replicate Study 2 in a different socio-political context. While Study 3
did not directly support the relationship between victimhood, group identification and conspiracy
beliefs, an integrated meta-analysis of all three studies provides evidence for a significant interaction of
victimhood and group identification in predicting conspiracy beliefs.
emerging in response to victimizing events may play a key role in the breakdown of social cohesion. We performed a nationally
representative survey in Poland (N = 965) two years after the Smoleńsk airplane crash in which the Polish president was killed, together
with 95 political officials and high-ranking military officers. The survey found that people endorsing conspiratorial accounts of the Smoleńsk
catastrophe preferred to distance themselves from conspiracy non-believers, while skeptics preferred greater distance to conspiracy
believers. We also examined the role of people’s belief in the uniqueness of in-group historical suffering as an important antecedent of both
conspiracy thinking and hostility towards outgroups (conspiracy believers and non-believers).
less powerful “victims”. In this article we test whether collective victimhood facilitates conspiracy
thinking. Study 1 showed that perceived group victimhood is associated with generic and group-specific
conspiracy beliefs, but only for individuals who identify highly with their ingroup. Study 2 employed
an experimental design to show that experimentally increased group victimhood leads to increased
endorsement of conspiracy beliefs among high ingroup identifiers, but decreases endorsement of
conspiracy beliefs among low identifiers. This effect was mediated by lack of trust towards outgroup
members. Study 3 sought to replicate Study 2 in a different socio-political context. While Study 3
did not directly support the relationship between victimhood, group identification and conspiracy
beliefs, an integrated meta-analysis of all three studies provides evidence for a significant interaction of
victimhood and group identification in predicting conspiracy beliefs.
emerging in response to victimizing events may play a key role in the breakdown of social cohesion. We performed a nationally
representative survey in Poland (N = 965) two years after the Smoleńsk airplane crash in which the Polish president was killed, together
with 95 political officials and high-ranking military officers. The survey found that people endorsing conspiratorial accounts of the Smoleńsk
catastrophe preferred to distance themselves from conspiracy non-believers, while skeptics preferred greater distance to conspiracy
believers. We also examined the role of people’s belief in the uniqueness of in-group historical suffering as an important antecedent of both
conspiracy thinking and hostility towards outgroups (conspiracy believers and non-believers).