Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy最新文献

Representative democracies hinge on citizens’ political participation, from casting votes to running for office at the local, state, and national levels. Yet, many questions remain regarding how to nurture political participation and leadership aspiration, especially early in life. Existing work has largely focused on adolescents’ concrete political behaviors, leaving their more abstract perceptions of politics—such as who they see politics representing and whether they view politics as impactful— understudied. Here, we examined these perceptions of political representation and impact among high school students (ages 13–17) in Queens, NY (N = 113) and tested how these perceptions relate to adolescents’ confidence and interest in pursuing leadership roles. Data was collected one week before and after the 2024 U.S. presidential election, allowing us to track real-time shifts in political perceptions and aspirations. Adolescents showed substantial variation across demographic and political characteristics, with perceptions of representation and impact interacting in nuanced ways, particularly for historically underrepresented groups. Election-related shifts in these perceptions further predicted changes in adolescents' confidence, and especially interest, in political leadership, suggesting a feedback loop that may contribute to persistent leadership inequities. This study underscores the importance of understanding adolescents’ abstract political thinking and informs efforts to foster more inclusive democratic leadership.

Many states have juvenile record sealing policies to allow formerly justice-involved juveniles to successfully re-enter society as adults. However, these policies are often not enforced consistently and transparently, creating inconsistencies between what the person discloses on a job application and what appears on their background check (i.e., a mismatch). We hypothesized that juvenile records would negatively influence hiring outcomes of adult applicants, especially when there was a mismatch between the background check and disclosure. We also hypothesized the effects would be worse for Black applicants. We used a mock-hiring survey paradigm, where 1054 participants made a hiring decision about a job applicant. As expected, juvenile records negatively influenced hiring outcomes, especially when there was a mismatch. Applicants were less likely to be hired when their disclosure of their record did not match the background check. We did not find support for the effects being worse for Black applicants. These results indicate that it is important to have juvenile record sealing policies to promote successful re-entry as adults and underline the importance of the policies being enforced transparently and consistently. Without transparent and consistent enforcement, these policies can backfire and cause more harm to the formerly justice-involved juveniles.

According to Allport's Contact Hypothesis, contact with individuals from different social groups fosters positive intergroup relations under certain conditions. Building on this theoretical framework, we examined the effects of direct (Study 1) and indirect (extended; Study 2) contact with refugees within (two different types of) Italian welcome projects in promoting positive intergroup relations. In Study 1, we surveyed 99 professionals and volunteers who experienced direct contact with refugees by working on welcome projects, which encourage asymmetrical (status inequality) or symmetrical (status equality) contact with refugees. We analyzed their promotion of extended contact. In Study 2, we surveyed 173 participants who had indirect extended contact with refugees, being proxies of the professionals and volunteers from Study 1. We assessed their intention to engage in prosocial behaviors in support of refugees. Participants completed questionnaires measuring intergroup trust, anxiety, stigma (Study 1), and refugee attitudes (Study 2). Results showed that both direct and indirect contact with refugees were associated with promoting extended contact (Study 1) and prosocial behaviors (Study 2). These effects were mediated by stigma in Study 1, and by attitudes toward refugees in Study 2. The study highlights the importance of contact within Italian welcome projects in fostering positive intergroup relations.

By 2024, 35 states had adopted self-defense laws, ranging from modified stand your ground (SYG) laws to expanding castle doctrine (CD) to apply beyond the home. Although these laws were intended to protect communities, states with these laws have higher firearm homicide rates. By surveying emerging adults, the current study examines how gun attitudes influence support for self-defense laws, such as CD and SYG. Participants were 444 students at a southeastern university recruited for a study on self-defense laws. Participants answered questions assessing their knowledge of SYG and CD laws, then received a brief description of each self-defense law and were asked whether they supported each law. Finally, participants were asked about their general gun attitudes and attitudes toward gun control. Results indicated that participants with more favorable gun control laws were less likely to support both stand your ground laws and castle doctrine. However, people with positive gun attitudes were more likely to support self-defense laws. People who previously or currently own a gun were more likely to support self-defense laws than those who have never owned one. Findings indicate that gun ownership and attitudes influence support for self-defense laws. Implications for policy and research are provided.

The current study explores whether personal experiences with discrimination are associated with greater ethnocultural empathy, whether greater ethnocultural empathy is then associated with greater support for policies helping marginalized groups, and whether these relationships are moderated by racial or ethnic identity or by resilience. Participants, 384 adult students recruited from introductory psychology courses at a large university in the southern region of the United States, completed an online Qualtrics survey that included measures assessing the variables of interest. Moderated mediation analyses revealed that for racial or ethnic minorities, discrimination experiences were positively related to ethnocultural empathy, which was positively related to support for Black-targeted affirmative action policies and for policies helping stigmatized groups (e.g., sexual or gender minorities, homeless individuals). Resilience did not moderate any of the relationships. This study's findings suggest that by fostering ethnocultural empathy, we have the potential to build a more harmonious and socially engaged society of people wanting to help others who are most in need.

This study explores the convergence of homelessness and environmental hazards within public discourse sources, focusing on three questions: How did public discourse sources differ in their portrayal of clearing the Zone, a contentious downtown Phoenix encampment? To what extent did Phoenix's Safe Outdoor Space feature in local public discourse sources’ coverage of homelessness? How was exposure to environmental hazards addressed in public discourse narratives surrounding homelessness during the clearing of the Zone and creation of the SOS? We employed social constructionism and thematic analysis to identify and interpret themes within public discourse sources (n = 111 records) from January 1 to December 31, 2023. When feasible, we incorporated content analysis to quantify distinct themes. We identified three themes related to clearing the Zone: Blame, Support for the city, and Skepticism of the city, as well as three themes around creating the SOS: Support for the city, Skepticism of the city, and Alternative solutions. For environmental hazards, we identified one theme: Environmental concerns. Our analysis suggests the need for a three-pronged strategy: year-round protection from environmental exposures, elevating the voices of those with lived experience, and expanding investments in housing.

This article presents the development and validation of the Neoliberal Ideological Beliefs Questionnaire (NLBQ), a novel measure designed to analyze neoliberal ideological beliefs specifically within the context of work and employment. The NLBQ is theoretically grounded in the distinction of three fundamental political neoliberal logics: individualism, instrumentality, and competition. To evaluate its psychometric properties, factorial, and construct validity, the NLBQ was administered to four convenience samples of altogether N = 4075 participants from Austria and Germany (Study 1: n = 664; Study 2: n = 458; Study 3: n = 559; Study 4: n = 2394). The initial 90-item pool, developed through extensive group discussions and iterative testing, was reduced to a final 18-item version through exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses (EFA and CFA). The four studies confirmed the three-dimensional structure of the NLBQ and demonstrated its convergent and incremental validity by computing bivariate and partial correlations with established scales measuring related constructs, such as neoliberal beliefs analyzed with an alternative measure (Neoliberal Beliefs Inventory), ideologies of market competition and shareholder interest, economic system justification, political left–right self-placement, social dominance orientation, dark triad personality, and group-focused enmity. The final 18-item version demonstrated satisfactory fit indices across all four samples. Finally, we derived a 9-item short version, which also showed strong psychometric properties.

While much is known about discriminatory behaviors in fields like the labor and housing markets, there is a dearth of empirical evidence on perceived acceptability of discrimination among the public. This study investigates this complex landscape by examining views on discrimination based on age, ethnicity, gender, and disability in Belgium through a web survey (N = 3000). Through four distinct vignettes based on housing and labor scenarios, we offer a deeper understanding of society's tolerance toward discriminatory practices. Age surfaces as the most tolerated form of discrimination, highlighting deeply ingrained ageist ideologies that overshadow the value of experience and wisdom in older individuals. Conversely, gender discrimination is met with the least acceptance, reflecting ongoing struggles for gender equality. Our findings shed light on the influence of authoritarian sentiments, particularly through the lens of social dominance orientation (SDO), on the acceptance of discrimination across all vignettes. We found a significant interaction between SDO and ethnicity, with the effect of SDO on the acceptability of discrimination being more pronounced in vignettes involving ethnicity as discrimination ground. While acknowledging limitations, our research sets the stage for future exploration of the multifaceted nature of discriminatory views and the intersectional identities that shape them.

Despite Latino Americans’ consistent support for the Democratic Party over the last five decades, the number of Latino Americans who voted for Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election grew by 10% compared to the 2020 election. What ideological and sociodemographic factors apart from ethnic identity may have influenced their voting behavior in the 2024 Presidential Election? Although previous work has demonstrated a person's Latino identity strength can influence their political behavior, Latino Americans hold other ideologies and sociodemographic factors that may influence their voting. Here, 186 Mexican Americans (the Latino group that voted the most for Harris) and 176 Cuban Americans (the Latino group that voted the most for Trump) participants completed measures of ethnic identity, acculturation, Latino-specific gender norms, conservatism, traditionalism, income, and religiosity among others. Across all participants, having higher levels of traditionalism was the most consistent predictor of voting for Trump over Harris. Voting for Trump over Harris was associated with higher levels of machismo (i.e., gender norms about men common in Latin American societies) only in Mexican Americans, whereas voting for Trump over Harris was associated with having a higher income only in Cuban Americans. These results suggest there are multiple, distinct ideologies and sociodemographic factors in Latino voters that influence their political preferences, rationales, and voting behavior.

As workplace inequality persists, understanding the psychological processes motivating collective action engagement becomes imperative. In one domain of collective action, labor unionization, membership in the United States has continuously declined since the 1980s. Despite this decline, recent surveys suggest that pro-union sentiment is rising. Amid workplace inequity and rising public interest in unionization, we draw from research on collective action and organizational identification to examine whether exposure to worker-organization conflict and information about unions changes how workers evaluate existing and novel organizational grievance procedures, and consequently, increases pro-union sentiment. Across four studies (N = 3,143), we find that exposure to workplace conflicts and information about unions reduces workers’ perceived alignment with organizational grievance procedures and increases pro-union attitudes, relative to control conditions where participants are not exposed to information about unions. These findings have implications for employee wellbeing and for the psychological processes implicated in collective action organizing.