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According to a conversational approach, survey respondents provide answers they believe to be relevant to an interaction. Norenzayan and Schwarz (1999) demonstrated that participants provide dispositional accounts for an action to a personality researcher, but contextual accounts to a social scientist. Two studies sought to replicate this finding and test if the effects were due to social desirability. Using original materials, Study 1 manipulated researcher identity and varied whether participants had reasons to explain the action (replication) or reasons that could not explain the action (non-reasons). Study 2 varied researcher identity and asked participants what they want to be like in the future or what they do not want to be like in the future. Individual differences in socially desirable responding were also assessed. Results replicated original findings without social desirability qualifying critical effects. This confirms that participants provide the kinds of answers that they believe to be relevant to the researchers.

Evidence suggests that politically right-leaning individuals are more likely to be closed-minded. Whether this association is inherent or subject to change has been the subject of debate, yet has not been formally tested. Through a meta-analysis, we find evidence of a changing association between conservatism and facets of closed-mindedness in the U.S. and international context using 341 unique samples, over 200,000 participants, and 920 estimates over 71 years. In the U.S., data ranging from 1948 to 2019 revealed a linear decline in the association between social conservatism (SC) and closed-mindedness, though economic conservatism (EC) did not vary in its association with closed-mindedness over time. Internationally across 18 countries, excluding the U.S., we observed a curvilinear decline in the association between SC and closed-mindedness over that same time, but no change in ECs association. We also tested variation over time for attitudinal measures of conservatism ranging between 1987 to 2018. In the U.S., we observed a linear increase in the association between right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) and closed-mindedness, with a similar linear increase in the association between social dominance orientation (SDO) and closed-mindedness. Internationally, there was a curvilinear increase in the association between RWA and closed-mindedness, but no change in the association with SDO. We discuss the changes to the political landscape that might explain our findings. ; reviewed ; acceptedVersion

Populism is on the rise with various movements having electoral breakthroughs. Most social-science research on populism has focused primarily on party tactics and rhetoric, and a definition for the term itself; only recently has populism emerged as a psychological construct. We contribute to this growing literature with two studies (n = 456 and n = 5,837) that investigated the cultural worldviews underpinned in populist attitudes. Using the social axioms model, an etic framework for assessing people's generalized social expectations, we linked populist attitudes to universal dimensions of culture. We found that higher levels of social cynicism and social flexibility, and to a lesser extent, lower levels of fate control and reward for application predicted populist attitudes. These findings indicate that people who endorse populist attitudes, across a range of contexts, are cynical regarding the social world, believe in alternative solutions to social dilemmas, but may also perceive a world that is difficult to control and potentially unfair. The discussion focuses on the cultural forces that may drive or facilitate populist attitudes across context and time. ; peerReviewed ; publishedVersion

Although masks (face coverings) are a prime tool in fighting airborne pathogens, during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States the use of masks encountered resistance based on existing patterns of cultural division. We argue that mask wearing must be understood basis on existing cultural frames assessed at both the individual level and the state level. We relied on prominent frameworks in cultural psychology: individualism-collectivism as well as independent and interdependent self-construals, the tightness-looseness framework, U.S. honor cultures, and political orientation as predictors. Using multilevel modeling, in a sample of 633 respondents from 45 U.S. states we investigated mask-wearing behavior, masks' perceived utility, implications for well-being, and the social meaning attributed to masks. Conservatism was linked to lower mask wearing, and consistently unfavorable perceptions of mask wearing. Collective interdependence predicted favorable perceptions of masks, as did state-level differences in collectivism; both constructs were linked with viewing mask wearing to be normative. Independent self-construal predicted a greater intent to wear masks, even though masks were also evaluated less favorably. Mediation analyses revealed that a single mediator, the perceived utility of mask wearing, was implicated in translating the effects of different cultural predictors into behavior. Additional findings highlighted that in tightener (vs. looser) states masks wearing was conceived of as a civic duty, whereas in U.S. honor states mask were seen as spoiling one's public image. Our discussion focuses on the cultural and political context of mask wearing, argues that different communities in the U.S. respond to its symbolic and social meaning, and suggest strategies to increase mask wearing among those who are otherwise reluctant to do so.

Populism is on the rise with various movements having electoral breakthroughs. Most social-science research on populism has focused primarily on party tactics and rhetoric, and a definition for the term itself; only recently has populism emerged as a psychological construct. We contribute to this growing literature with two studies (n = 456 and n = 5,837) that investigated the cultural worldviews underpinned in populist attitudes. Using the social axioms model, an etic framework for assessing people's generalized social expectations, we linked populist attitudes to universal dimensions of culture. We found that higher levels of social cynicism and social flexibility, and to a lesser extent, lower levels of fate control and reward for application predicted populist attitudes. These findings indicate that people who endorse populist attitudes, across a range of contexts, are cynical regarding the social world, believe in alternative solutions to social dilemmas, but may also perceive a world that is difficult to control and potentially unfair. The discussion focuses on the cultural forces that may drive or facilitate populist attitudes across context and time.

Many countries around the world embrace freedom and democracy as part of their political culture. However, culture is at least in part a human response to the ecological challenges that a society faces ; hence, it should not be surprising that the degree to which societies regulate the level of individual freedom is related to environmental circumstances. Previous research suggests that levels of societal freedom across countries are systematically related to three types of ecological threats: prevalence of pathogens, climate challenges, and natural disaster threat. Though their incidence overlaps, the literature has not yet provided a competitive test. Drawing upon the ecocultural framework, we tested five rival hypotheses, alternately focused on the above ecological factors and their interactions with economic wealth in explaining country variations in socio-political freedom. Focusing on data from 150 countries, we performed a series of linear mixed-effects regressions predicting freedom in the domains of politics, media, and economy. We found that countries with higher pathogen prevalence were more likely to suppress democracy and media freedom. Economic wealth, however, moderated the effect of pathogen prevalence on economic freedom, with the main effect being only found among wealthy countries, but not among poor countries. In contrast, natural disaster threat predicted political freedom and press freedom only among poor countries, consistent with the idea that disaster threat accompanied by poor resources promote socio-political freedom as a means of increasing collective survival. Throughout our analyses, we found no support for hypotheses based on climatic challenges. In addition, our multilevel approach revealed that country scores for socio-political freedom were highly clustered within world regions, accounting for substantial portions of variance. Overall, the present research offers a nuanced view of the interplay between ecology and wealth in the emergence of socio-political freedom. We discuss new directions in future research considering methodological and theoretical contributions of the present findings.