“We Are People”

Ingroup Humanization as an Existential Defense

Vaes, Jeroen
Heflick, Nathan A.
Goldenberg, Jamie L.

¹Department of Developmental Psychology and Socialization (DPSS), University of Padova, Padova, Italy
²Department of Psychology, University of South Florida

Jeroen Vaes, Department of Developmental Psychology and Socialization (DPSS), Via Venezia, 8, 35131 Padova, Italy [email protected]

Submission January 30, 2009. Revision August 20, 2009. Accepted August 21, 2009.

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 98(5):p 750-760, May 2010.

Prior research has shown the importance of humanness in shaping one's social identity, but no research has examined why this is the case. The present article reveals that humanizing the ingroup serves a terror management function. In 3 studies, Italian (Studies 1 and 2) and American (Study 3) participants humanized their own group more when their mortality was salient. In Study 3, humanizing the ingroup also functioned to reduce the accessibility of death thoughts. Together, these studies provide clear support for terror management theory as an explanatory framework for ingroup humanization.