Concern with COVID-19 pandemic threat and attitudes towards immigrants: the mediating effect of the desire for tightness

• Main Authors: Mula, Silvana, Di Santo, Daniela, Resta, Elena, Bakhtiari, Farin, Baldner, Conrad, Molinario, Erica, Pierro, Antonio, Gelfand, Michele, J., Denison, Emmy, Agostini, Maximilian, Belanger, Jocelyn J, Gutzkow, Ben, Kreienkamp, Jannis, Abakoumkin, Georgios, Abdul Khaiyom, Jamilah Hanum, Leander, N Pontus
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V. 2022
• Subjects: BF Psychology; BF309 Consciousness. Cognition; BF501 Motivation; H Social Sciences (General); HM706 Social structure; HM711 Groups and organizations; RA Public aspects of medicine; RA644.C67 Coronavirus infections. COVID-19 (Disease). COVID-19 Pandemic, 2020
• Online Access: http://irep.iium.edu.my/95820/7/95820_Concern%20with%20COVID-19%20pandemic%20threat.pdf; http://irep.iium.edu.my/95820/; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cresp.2021.100028

Tightening social norms is thought to be adaptive for dealing with collective threat yet it may have nega- tive consequences for increasing prejudice. The present research investigated the role of desire for cultural tightness, triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic, in increasing negative attitudes towards immigrants. We used participant-level data from 41 countries ( N = 55,015) collected as part of the PsyCorona project, a cross- national longitudinal study on responses to COVID-19. Our predictions were tested through multilevel and SEM models, treating participants as nested within countries. Results showed that people’s concern with COVID- 19 threat was related to greater desire for tightness which, in turn, was linked to more negative attitudes towards immigrants. These findings were followed up with a longitudinal model ( N = 2,349) which also showed that people’s heightened concern with COVID-19 in an earlier stage of the pandemic was associated with an increase in their desire for tightness and negative attitudes towards immigrants later in time. Our findings offer insight into the trade-offs that tightening social norms under collective threat has for human groups.