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There is evidence that democracies are under threat around the world while the quest for strong leaders is increasing. Although the causes of these developments are complex and multifaceted, here we focus on one factor: the extent to which citizens express materialist and post-materialist concerns. We explore whether objective higher levels of democracy are differentially associated with materialist and post-materialist concerns and, in turn, whether this is related to the wish for a strong leader. Testing this hypothesis across 27 countries (N = 5,741) demonstrated a direct negative effect of democracies’ development on the wish for a strong leader. Further, multi-level mediation analysis showed that the relation between the Democracy Index and the wish for a strong leader was mediated by materialist concerns. This pattern of results suggests that lower levels of democracy are associated with enhanced concerns about basic needs and this is linked to greater support for strong leaders., info:eu-repo/semantics/published

Onrust en onbehagen zijn karakteristieke kenmerken voor deze tijd. In veel landen, waaronder Nederland, is de stemming in de samenleving dat de maatschappij diepe problemen heeft, verrot is. De campagne van president Donald Trump droeg bijvoorbeeld het idee uit dat de Amerikaanse maatschappij in diep verval is geraakt. Hoewel dit collectieve maatschappelijk ongenoegen dus belangrijke consequenties lijkt te kunnen hebben, werd het tot voor kort nauwelijks onderzocht. Het doel van dit proefschrift is het beantwoorden van de vraag: wat is maatschappelijk ongenoegen? Wij stellen voor om maatschappelijk ongenoegen te conceptualiseren als een aspect van de tijdgeest: een collectief gedeelde, impliciete, gegeneraliseerde perceptie van de staat van de maatschappij. Maatschappelijk ongenoegen is een deel van onze sociale realiteit: de collectieve perceptie dat wij, onze maatschappij als geheel, er slecht aan toe zijn. Om maatschappelijk ongenoegen te kunnen onderzoeken en meten, hebben we een operationalisatie ontwikkeld: een latente “general factor” Z. Met deze conceptualisatie en operationalisatie hebben we maatschappelijk ongenoegen nader onderzocht. We hebben gekeken naar consequenties: uit ons onderzoek blijkt dat maatschappelijk ongenoegen beïnvloedt hoe mensen krantenkoppen interpreteren en de kans op stemmen voor een extreme politieke partij vergroot. Tevens blijkt dat de mate van maatschappelijk ongenoegen samenhangt met mediagebruik. We hebben ook een internationale Z-schaal ontwikkeld om maatschappelijk ongenoegen tussen verschillende landen te kunnen vergelijken. Dit proefschrift levert dus een nieuwe benadering om maatschappelijk ongenoegen te onderzoeken. Onze resultaten tot nu toe stroken met deze benadering en wijzen richtingen aan voor toekomstig onderzoek., In recent years, a sense of doom and gloom about the state of society has loomed large in many countries around the world. The campaign of president Donald Trump embraced the idea that American society is in decline. While this collective societal discontent appears to have influenced major political developments in recent years, it until recently was scarcely studied. The aim of this dissertation is to answer the question: what is societal discontent? We propose to conceptualize societal discontent as an aspect of the “Zeitgeist”: a collectively shared, tacit, generalized perception of the state of society. Societal discontent is an aspect of our social reality: The collective perception that we, our society as a whole, is doing badly. In order to the able to study and measure societal discontent, we developed an operationalisation: a latent “general factor” Z. With this conceptualisation and operationalisation, we subsequently studied the phenomenon societal discontent. We studied its consequences: Our research showed that societal discontent influences how people interpret newspaper headlines and predicts voting for extreme political parties. In addition, our research showed that there is a relationship between the extent of societal discontent and media use. We also developed an international Z-scale to compare societal discontent across countries. This dissertation provides a new approach to study societal discontent. Our results so far have been consistent with this approach and point to directions for future research.

Collective nostalgia for the good old days of the country thrives across the world. However, little is known about the social psychological dynamics of this collective emotion across cultures. We predicted that collective nostalgia is triggered by collective angst as it helps people to restore a sense of in-group continuity via stronger in-group belonging and out-group rejection (in the form of opposition to immigrants). Based on a sample (N = 5,956) of individuals across 27 countries, the general pattern of results revealed that collective angst predicts collective nostalgia, which subsequently relates to stronger feelings of in-group continuity via in-group belonging (but not via out-group rejection). Collective nostalgia generally predicted opposition to immigrants, but this was subsequently not related to in-group continuity.

Collective nostalgia for the good old days of the country thrives across the world. However, little is known about the social psychological dynamics of this collective emotion across cultures. We predicted that collective nostalgia is triggered by collective angst as it helps people to restore a sense of in-group continuity via stronger in-group belonging and out-group rejection (in the form of opposition to immigrants). Based on a sample (N = 5,956) of individuals across 27 countries, the general pattern of results revealed that collective angst predicts collective nostalgia, which subsequently relates to stronger feelings of in-group continuity via in-group belonging (but not via out-group rejection). Collective nostalgia generally predicted opposition to immigrants, but this was subsequently not related to in-group continuity., SCOPUS: ar.j, info:eu-repo/semantics/published

Relative deprivation (RD) is the judgment that one or one’s ingroup is worse off compared with some relevant standard coupled with feelings of dissatisfaction, anger, and resentment. RD predicts a wide range of outcomes, but it is unclear whether this relationship is moderated by national cultural differences. Therefore, in the first study, we used national assessments of individual-collectivism and power distance to code 303 effect sizes from 31 different countries with 200,578 participants. RD predicted outcomes ranging from life satisfaction to collective action more strongly within individualistic nations. A second survey of 6,112 undergraduate university students from 28 different countries confirmed the predictive value of RD. Again, the relationship between individual RD and different outcomes was stronger for students who lived in more individualistic countries. Group-based RD also predicted political trust more strongly for students who lived in countries marked by lower power distance. RD effects, although consistent predictors, are culturally bounded. In particular, RD is more likely to motivate reactions within individualistic countries that emphasize individual agency and achievement as a source of self-worth., SCOPUS: ar.j, info:eu-repo/semantics/published

Sociologists coined the term "anomie" to describe societies that are characterized by disintegration and deregulation. Extending beyond conceptualizations of anomie that conflate the measurements of anomie as 'a state of society' and as a 'state of mind', we disentangle these conceptualizations and develop an analysis and measure of this phenomenon focusing on anomie as a perception of the 'state of society'. We propose that anomie encompasses two dimensions: a perceived breakdown in social fabric (i.e. disintegration as lack of trust and erosion of moral standards) and a perceived breakdown in leadership (i.e. deregulation as lack of legitimacy and effectiveness of leadership). Across six studies we present evidence for the validity of the new measure, the Perception of Anomie Scale (PAS). Studies 1a and 1b provide evidence for the proposed factor structure and internal consistency of PAS. Studies 2a-c provide evidence of convergent and discriminant validity. Finally, assessing PAS in 28 countries, we show that PAS correlates with national indicators of societal functioning and that PAS predicts national identification and well-being (Studies 3a & 3b). The broader implications of the anomie construct for the study of group processes are discussed., SCOPUS: ar.j, info:eu-repo/semantics/published