A function of form: terror management and structuring the social world.
Drawing on lay epistemology theory, the authors assessed a terror management analysis of the psychological function of structuring social information. Seven studies tested variations of the hypothesis that simple, benign interpretations of social information function, in part, to manage death-related anxiety. In Studies 1-4, mortality salience (MS) exaggerated primacy effects and reliance on representative information, decreased preference for a behaviorally inconsistent target among those high in personal need for structure (PNS), and increased high-PNS participants' preference for interpersonal balance. In Studies 5-7, MS increased high-PNS participants' preference for interpretations that suggest a just world and a benevolent causal order of events in the social world.
Landau
Mark J
MJ
Department of Social Psychology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA. mjlandau@email.arizona.edu
Johns
Michael
M
Greenberg
Jeff
J
Pyszczynski
Tom
T
Martens
Andy
A
Goldenberg
Jamie L
JL
Solomon
Sheldon
S
D000328:Adult; D000339:Affect; D003071:Cognition; D005239:Fear; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009042:Motivation; D010555:Personality Inventory; D012919:Social Behavior; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires