title: Me against we: in-group transgression, collective shame, and in-group-directed hostility.
abstract: People can experience great distress when a group to which they belong (in-group) is perceived to have committed an immoral act. We hypothesised that people would direct hostility toward a transgressing in-group whose actions threaten their self-image and evoke collective shame. Consistent with this theorising, three studies found that reminders of in-group transgression provoked several expressions of in-group-directed hostility, including in-group-directed hostile emotion (Studies 1 and 2), in-group-directed derogation (Study 2), and in-group-directed punishment (Study 3). Across studies, collective shame-but not the related group-based emotion collective guilt-mediated the relationship between in-group transgression and in-group-directed hostility. Implications for group-based emotion, social identity, and group behaviour are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-5050, USA. ppiff@berkeley.edu
authors.forename: Paul K
authors.initials: PK
authors.lastname: Piff
authors.forename: Andres G
authors.initials: AG
authors.lastname: Martinez
authors.forename: Dacher
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Keltner
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D028661:Complicity; D005260:Female; D006167:Guilt; D006791:Hostility; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D012752:Shame; D012919:Social Behavior; D012933:Social Identification