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People of color (PoC) face common threats as marginalized ethno-racial groups, yet it remains unclear what drives a diverse range of people to collectively mobilize. Relative to White Americans, PoC are disproportionately endangered by environmental pollution. We suggest that when facing common threats, such as environmental injustice, making salient PoC-Identity (PoC-ID)—a superordinate category encompassing non-White groups—may motivate its members to collectively act. In a study with nationally representative samples of Black, Latinx, and Asian Americans (N= 1,866), we found that higher levels of PoC-ID predicted attitudes and behavioral intentions to confront environmental injustices, which were mediated by anger about environmental injustices and efficacy as PoC. Although PoC-ID consistently explained Black Americans’ attitudes and behavioral intentions, its influence among Latinx and Asian Americans was moderated by self-perceived prototypicality as PoC. We discuss how these findings advance understanding of the psychological mechanisms of coalition-building among marginalized groups.

This study assesses the impact of different immigrant policy climates on how Latinos feel about themselves, their place in their state and country, and how they think they are viewed by others. Using survey data from Arizona and New Mexico, we find that Latinos in Arizona exhibit lower levels of belonging than Latinos in New Mexico, but their alienation is confined to the state level. We also find that the U.S. born are most sensitive to the state climate. We conclude that policies that delineate outsiders from insiders by immigration status have wide ranging effects that fall prominently on the U.S. born.

We suggest that Whites’ declining share of the U.S. population threatens their status as the most prototypical ethnic group in America. This prototypicality threatshould lead to growing resistance toward diversity, motivated by the desire to reassert Whites’ standing as prototypical Americans. In Study 1, how dramatically Whites perceived their share of the population to decline predicted support for cultural assimilation, mediated by prototypicality threat (controlling for realistic and symbolic threat). This relationship held only among Whites who felt that ethnic groups differ in their prototypicality, not among those who saw all groups representing America equally. Study 2 experimentally manipulated exposure to demographic projections such that Whites who saw their group shrinking showed weaker diversity endorsement relative to those who believed their share to be stable, again mediated by prototypicality threat. These findings reveal Whites’ threatened prototypicality as a novel, emerging source of resistance toward diversity in 21st-century America.

Discussions of the impact of growing inequality have focused on objective indicators. Focusing on what individuals have or do not have can be misleading without understanding how they subjectively interpret the availability of resources. Relative deprivation (RD) occurs when individuals compare themselves with better-off others and conclude that they do not deserve their disadvantage. These upward comparisons, whether imposed or chosen, can damage people’s emotions, behavior, and even mental and physical health. How people respond to RD depends on whether they (a) experience the disadvantage directed toward them as a unique individual or as a member of a group (e.g., ethnic category, occupation), (b) feel anger or another emotion (e.g., sadness), and (c) view the system (e.g., workplace, nation) as open to change. Mobility interventions (e.g., housing and school vouchers) may have unexpected adverse consequences that direct improvements to the local infrastructure and community do not. Costs of RD (including physical illness) increase if people cannot address perceived inequities effectively. RD explains why simply enumerating resources and opportunities does not fully explain how relative disadvantage produces outcomes ranging from social protest to illness. Insights from psychological science that show how individuals respond to social inequities can inform policies for building communities and improving well-being.

Two studies investigated the experiences U.S. Asians and Latinos have with national origin identity neglect, which occurs when others fail to recognize distinctions among national origin groups that comprise the shared, pan-ethnic category. Participants considered situations in which another individual (1) failed to acknowledge or (2) appropriately acknowledged their national origin identity. Individuals in the neglect condition reported stronger negative emotions and partner evaluations. Conversely, participants in the recognition condition reported stronger positive emotions and partner evaluations. These effects generalized such that those who experienced neglect rated the partner’s ethnic group more negatively. The effects were stronger among those highly identified with their national origin group. Nearly all participants (91%) reported having experienced national origin identity neglect in daily life. These findings suggest that treating members of distinct social groups as interchangeable parts of a broader category, though seemingly benign, can elicit negative emotional responses and adversely affect intergroup relations.

The psychological experience of respect has implications for the nature and quality of group life and for the individual's psychological and physical well‐being. However, the manner in which respect has been studied and defined has frequently differed among researchers, making it difficult to connect the various findings. Whereas some researchers have focused on the implications of respectful treatment from group members (e.g., authorities, peers), others have focused on individuals’ perceptions of how they are generally evaluated by the group. We present the dual pathway model of respect in which these various lines of research are integrated within a single framework. Organized around two basic social motives – the need for status and the need to belong – the model describes two pathways (status evaluation and liking) through which respect from the group shapes social engagement, self‐esteem, and health. These evaluative dimensions are informed by interactions with group authorities and peers and differentially predict social psychological outcomes.