Sense of control and conspiracy perceptions: Generative directions on a well-worn path.

We review recent research on the well-established relationship between sense of control and conspiracy perceptions, identifying challenges and promising new directions. First, we examine recent efforts to distinguish sense of control from adjacent but confounding psychological constructs (including uncertainty, threat, and powerlessness). Second, we discuss the limitations of experimentally manipulating sense of control and the trend toward natural experiments. Finally, we consider boundary conditions that moderate the relationship and clarify the types of conspiracy perceptions that sense of control predicts. By integrating past findings to more precisely define sense of control and its effects on cognition, we hope to identify productive avenues for future research.

Mitigating and managing COVID-19 conspiratorial beliefs.

BACKGROUND/AIM: Belief in COVID-19 related conspiracy theories is a widespread and consequential problem that healthcare leaders need to confront. In this article, we draw on insights from social psychology and organisational behaviour to offer evidence-based advice that healthcare leaders can use to reduce the spread of conspiratorial beliefs and ameliorate their negative effects, both during the current pandemic and beyond. CONCLUSION: Leaders can effectively combat conspiratorial beliefs by intervening early and bolstering people's sense of control. Leaders can also address some of the problematic behaviours that result from conspiratorial beliefs by introducing incentives and mandates (e.g., vaccine mandates). However, because of the limitations of incentives and mandates, we suggest that leaders complement these techniques with interventions that leverage the power of social norms and increase people's connections to others.

An eye for an eye? A meta-analysis of negative reciprocity in organizations.

Most models of negative workplace behaviors (NWB) are individual in nature, focusing on individual attitudes (e.g., satisfaction) and general workplace perceptions (e.g., procedural justice) that motivate NWB. Less commonly considered are explorations of relationally based negative workplace behaviors-how NWB from Party A is related to reciprocation of NWB from Party B. Based on 2 competing conceptualizations in the literature, that behavior is reciprocated "in-kind" in an eye for an eye exchange or that behavior tends to escalate or spiral over time, we develop a framework for negative reciprocity that considers NWB in terms of severity, activity, and target. This framework addresses (a) whether Party A's NWB is associated with behavior of a similar or greater level (i.e., activity and severity) from Party B; and (b) whether Party B's reciprocating behavior is directed back at Party A (i.e., direct) or transferred onto others (i.e., displaced). We meta-analytically test these relationships with 246 independent samples (N = 96,930) and find strongest support for relationships indicating that NWB from Party A is largely returned in-kind, followed closely by relationships indicative of escalation. We also found that as the frequency of Party A's NWB increases, so too does the frequency of reciprocity behavior of equal levels. Surprisingly, differences related to the target of the behavior as well as differences based on whether the data were cross-sectional or longitudinal were generally negligible. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Regulatory Focus and Conspiratorial Perceptions: The Importance of Personal Control.

We examine when and why people subscribe to conspiratorial beliefs, suggesting that promotion focus reduces conspiratorial perceptions by activating a sense of personal control. Study 1 established that individuals primed with promotion focus are less likely to perceive conspiracies than those in a baseline condition. However, individuals primed with prevention focus and those in a baseline condition did not differ in their levels of conspiratorial beliefs. Study 2 demonstrated that soldiers higher in promotion focus were less likely to endorse conspiracy theories because of their heightened sense of control; this relationship did not emerge for soldiers higher in prevention focus. Study 3 found that conspiratorial beliefs increased when individuals primed with promotion focus recalled personal control loss, whereas those primed with prevention focus were unaffected by personal control loss. Using measures and manipulations of regulatory focus and personal control, we establish when and why promotion focus reduces conspiracy theories.

Compensatory control and the appeal of a structured world.

People are motivated to perceive themselves as having control over their lives. Consequently, they respond to events and cognitions that reduce control with compensatory strategies for restoring perceived control to baseline levels. Prior theory and research have documented 3 such strategies: bolstering personal agency, affiliating with external systems perceived to be acting on the self's behalf, and affirming clear contingencies between actions and outcomes within the context of reduced control (here termed specific structure). We propose a 4th strategy: affirming nonspecific structure, or seeking out and preferring simple, clear, and consistent interpretations of the social and physical environments. Formulating this claim suggests that people will respond to reduced control by affirming structured interpretations that are unrelated to the control-reducing condition, and even those that entail otherwise adverse outcomes (e.g., pessimistic health prospects). Section 1 lays the conceptual foundation for our review, situating the proposed phenomenon in the literatures on control motivation and threat-compensation mechanisms. Section 2 reviews studies that have demonstrated that trait and state variations in perceived control predict a wide range of epistemic structuring tendencies, including pattern recognition and causal reasoning. We posit that these tendencies reflect a common desire for a structured understanding of one's environment. Accordingly, a new meta-analysis spanning the reviewed studies (k = 55) revealed that control reduction predicts nonspecific structure affirmation with a moderate effect size (r = .25). Section 3 reviews research on individual differences and situational moderators of this effect. The discussion addresses the interplay of compensatory control strategies and practical implications.

The reappropriation of stigmatizing labels: the reciprocal relationship between power and self-labeling.

We present a theoretical model of reappropriation--taking possession of a slur previously used exclusively by dominant groups to reinforce another group's lesser status. Ten experiments tested this model and established a reciprocal relationship between power and self-labeling with a derogatory group term. We first investigated precursors to self-labeling: Group, but not individual, power increased participants' willingness to label themselves with a derogatory term for their group. We then examined the consequences of such self-labeling for both the self and observers. Self-labelers felt more powerful after self-labeling, and observers perceived them and their group as more powerful. Finally, these labels were evaluated less negatively after self-labeling, and this attenuation of stigma was mediated by perceived power. These effects occurred only for derogatory terms (e.g., queer, bitch), and not for descriptive (e.g., woman) or majority-group (e.g., straight) labels. These results suggest that self-labeling with a derogatory label can weaken the label's stigmatizing force.

Power reduces the press of the situation: implications for creativity, conformity, and dissonance.

Although power is often conceptualized as the capacity to influence others, the current research explores whether power psychologically protects people from influence. In contrast to classic social psychological research demonstrating the strength of the situation in directing attitudes, expressions, and intentions, 5 experiments (using experiential primes, semantic primes, and role manipulations of power) demonstrate that the powerful (a) generate creative ideas that are less influenced by salient examples, (b) express attitudes that conform less to the expressed opinions of others, (c) are more influenced by their own social value orientation relative to the reputation of a negotiating opponent, and (d) perceive greater choice in making counterattitudinal statements. This last experiment illustrates that power is not always psychologically liberating; it can create internal conflict, arousing dissonance, and thereby lead to attitude change. Across the experiments, high-power participants were immune to the typical press of situations, with intrapsychic processes having greater sway than situational or interpersonal ones on their creative and attitudinal expressions.

Lacking control increases illusory pattern perception.

We present six experiments that tested whether lacking control increases illusory pattern perception, which we define as the identification of a coherent and meaningful interrelationship among a set of random or unrelated stimuli. Participants who lacked control were more likely to perceive a variety of illusory patterns, including seeing images in noise, forming illusory correlations in stock market information, perceiving conspiracies, and developing superstitions. Additionally, we demonstrated that increased pattern perception has a motivational basis by measuring the need for structure directly and showing that the causal link between lack of control and illusory pattern perception is reduced by affirming the self. Although these many disparate forms of pattern perception are typically discussed as separate phenomena, the current results suggest that there is a common motive underlying them.