BulletinPersonality and Social Psychology
http://psp.sagepub.com/content/39/4/523The online version of this article can be found at:
DOI: 10.1177/0146167213478200 2013 39: 523 originally published online 1 March 2013
Pers Soc Psychol Bull
Paul G. Bain, Matthew J. Hornsey, Renata Bongiorno, Yoshihisa Kashima and Daniel Crimston
Supporting Social ChangeCollective Futures: How Projections About the Future of Society Are Related to Actions and Attitudes
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Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin39(4) 523 –539© 2013 by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, IncReprints and permissions: sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.navDOI: 10.1177/0146167213478200pspb.sagepub.com
Utopian images of the future of society are often credited with motivating action in the present. Classic examples are Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech motivating action on racial equality, and John Lennon’s “Imagine” inspiring peace advocates. Similarly, dystopian futures, like projections about the devastating consequences of climate change (e.g., Gore & Guggenheim, 2006; Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC], 2007), or science fiction like
1984
(Orwell, 1949/1990), communicate visions of the trajectory of society intended to spur us into changing course. Consequently, it is not surprising that discussions of the future of society are common in political discourse (Dun-mire, 2005). For example, President Obama implored Amer-icans to “win the future” by supporting his policies (Obama, 2011), and Republican Political Activity Committees reflected a core focus on the future of the nation with names like “Restore Our Future” (supporting Romney) and “Make Us Great Again” (supporting Perry).Within social psychology, there is increasing recognition that we think about the future of our groups (Cinnirella, 1998), and that images of society’s future are important for shaping social change (Reicher & Hopkins, 2001). Noam Chomsky (1970/1999) expressed this view clearly: “Social action must be animated by a vision of a future society, and by explicit judgements of value concerning the character of this future society” (p. 100). Yet psychologists still know little about how people think about the future of society (Reicher, 2008).Recent research has begun to fill this void. Sani et al. (2007) showed that people desire “collective continuity”—a coherent image of their nation extending from the past into the future—which fosters their well-being (Sani, Bowe, & Herrera, 2008). Believing that society is improving/progressing
PSP
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10.1177/0146167213478200Personality and Social Psychology BulletinBain et al.
1
University of Queensland, St Lucia, Australia
2
University of Melbourne, Australia
Corresponding Author:
Paul G. Bain, School of Psychology, University of Queensland, St Lucia QLD 4072, Australia. E-mail: p.bain@psy.uq.edu.au
Collective Futures: How Projections About the Future of Society Are Related to Actions and Attitudes Supporting Social Change
Paul G. Bain
1
, Matthew J. Hornsey
1
, Renata Bongiorno
1
, Yoshihisa Kashima
2
, and Daniel Crimston
1
Abstract
We identified the active ingredients in people’s visions of society’s future (“collective futures”) that could drive political behavior in the present. In eight studies (
N
= 595), people imagined society in 2050 where climate change was mitigated (Study 1), abortion laws relaxed (Study 2), marijuana legalized (Study 3), or the power of different religious groups had increased (Studies 4-8). Participants rated how this future society would differ from today in terms of societal-level dysfunction and development (e.g., crime, inequality, education, technology), people’s character (warmth, competence, morality), and their values (e.g., conservation, self-transcendence). These measures were related to present-day attitudes/intentions that would promote/prevent this future (e.g., act on climate change, vote for a Muslim politician). A projection about benevolence in society (i.e., warmth/morality of people’s character) was the only dimension consistently and uniquely associated with present-day attitudes and intentions across contexts. Implications for social change theories, political communication, and policy design are discussed.
Keywords
future, social change, religion, social issues, benevolence, stereotype content
Received April 29, 2012; revision accepted December 2, 2012
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Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin
39(4)
restores people’s sense of control (Rutjens, van Harreveld, & van der Pligt, 2010) and alleviates death anxiety (Rutjens, van der Pligt, & van Harreveld, 2009). Furthermore, people experience negative emotions when they believe their ethnic group’s future is under threat through losing their cultural identity/practices (Wohl, Branscombe, & Reysen, 2010), or from becoming a minority (Outten, Schmitt, Miller, & Garcia, 2012).While existing research has focused on the emotional implications of thinking about the future of groups, one of the most important implications of thoughts about the future is in guiding and motivating current action (Gilbert & Wilson, 2007; Suddendorf, 2006). Our research program focuses on these
motivational
implications of thinking about society’s future, aligning it closely to Chomsky’s claim. That is, are people’s projections about the future of society related to their attitudes and actions in the present, such as voting intentions or political activism, which would promote or prevent that future occurring? A second major difference lies in our focus on the
content
of projections about future society—identifying how people think society will change in the future, and determining which dimen-sions of change are related to current attitudes and behav-iors. This content spans both changes in people themselves (e.g., stereotypical traits and values) and changes in broader society (e.g., crime and technological progress). A third dif-ference is that we examine beliefs about the future of soci-ety across diverse contexts, such as where climate change is prevented, where marijuana is legalized, or where athe-ism becomes dominant, with an aim to identify
context- general
relationships between beliefs about society’s future and current attitudes/actions. We propose a framework for examining these societal projections, which we call “col-lective futures.”
The “Collective Futures” Framework
Figure 1 describes our framework relating beliefs about the future of society to present-day attitudes and actions. Some contexts involve different social policies (e.g., legalizing marijuana, relaxing abortion laws, acting on climate change), while others may reflect intergroup relations such as changes in group status relative to others—what Turner and col-leagues have called “cognitive alternatives” (Tajfel & Turner, 1986; Turner & Brown, 1978). Thus, people imagine a future state of society where a proposed change has occurred (e.g., where marijuana has been legalized, or where atheists have become a majority).In each context, people think about how that future soci-ety would be different from today. These projections include (a) broad societal change, including the extent of societal dysfunction (e.g., crime) and societal development (e.g., technological progress); and (b) changes in the character of people, including stereotypical traits and values.The third part of the collective futures framework relates these projections about future society to present-day atti-tudes and behaviors that would promote or prevent this future society occurring. Here we focus on political behav-iors such as voting intentions, political activities, and sup- porting religion playing a role in government decisions.
Dimensions of Collective Futures Beliefs
The core of the collective futures framework lies in the pro- jections people make about society in the future. This focus might initially appear futile because the future entails unbounded possibilities, so projections would be highly diverse, opaque, or incoherent (Tonn, Hemrick, & Conrad, 2006), and with substantial contextual variation. For exam- ple, very different images of a future American society may be invoked when considering legalizing marijuana com- pared with becoming a religious theocracy. Nonetheless, we propose that people are able to make judgments on some basic dimensions about future societies that are likely to be relevant across contexts, including changes in broad societal factors (societal dysfunction and development) and changes in people’s character (their traits or values).As collective futures are about society, society-wide changes are particularly relevant. We focused initially on sociological problems, like crime, poverty, and disease (“societal dysfunction”), as these represent major concerns of national governments and international bodies such as the United Nations. Thus, in each context we asked partici- pants whether there would be more or less poverty, dis-ease, and other indicators of dysfunction in the future compared with today. However, projections to the future can involve forecasts about future economic and
Figure 1.
The collective futures framework.
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