Collective Victimhood Beliefs and Conflict-Related Attitudes: A Meta-Analysis

Abstract

This study conducts a meta-analysis of the impact of collective victimhood beliefs on conflict-related attitudes. Examining 745 estimates from 103 articles, we assess the relationship between collective victimhood beliefs and hawkishness, reconciliation, out-group exclusion, and in-group attachment. While we find an aggregate positive association between collective victimhood beliefs and conflict-enhancing attitudes, there is an important distinction between non-inclusive and inclusive forms of collective victimhood: non-inclusive collective victimhood beliefs are associated with greater conflict-enhancing attitudes, whereas inclusive collective victimhood beliefs generally have opposing effects. These results are consistent across a wide range of geographic contexts, types of conflict experiences, and identities. They also extend to the association between collective victimhood beliefs and the emotions and cognitive perspectives that are often identified as mediators. Methodologically, observational and experimental studies reach similar conclusions about the direction of collective victimhood beliefs' impact, but experimental studies find consistently smaller effect sizes.

Keywords

conflict processes political psychology trust social capital

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Abdelal

Herrera

Y. M.

Johnston

A. I.

McDermott

(2006). Identity as a variable. Perspectives on Politics, 4(4), 695–711. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1537592706060440

Adelman

Leidner

Ünal

Nahhas

Shnabel

(2016). A whole other story: Inclusive victimhood narratives reduce competitive victimhood and intergroup hostility. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 42(10), 1416–1430. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167216662868

Alexander

J. C.

(2013). Trauma: A social theory. John Wiley & Sons.

Al-Ghazzi

(2021). We will be great again: Historical victimhood in populist discourse. European Journal of Cultural Studies, 24(1), 45–59. https://doi.org/10.1177/1367549420985851

Alrababa’h

Williamson

Dillon

Hainmueller

Hangartner

Hotard

Laitin

D. D.

Lawrence

Weinstein

(2023). Learning from null effects: A bottom-up approach. Political Analysis, 31(3), 448–456. https://doi.org/10.1017/pan.2021.51

Ariely

(2019). National days, national identity, and collective memory: Exploring the impact of holocaust day in israel. Political Psychology, 40(6), 1391–1406. https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12595

Barnhart

(2020). The consequences of humiliation: Anger and status in world politics. Cornell University Press.

Barrett

L. F.

(2006). Valence is a basic building block of emotional life. Journal of Research in Personality, 40(1), 35–55. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2005.08.006

Bar-Tal

Chernyak-Hai

Schori

Gundar

(2009a). A sense of self-perceived collective victimhood in intractable conflicts. International Review of the Red Cross, 91(874), 229–258. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1816383109990221

10.

Bar-Tal

Raviv

Dgani-Hirsh

(2009b). The influence of the ethos of conflict on Israeli jews’ interpretation of Jewish—Palestinian encounters. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 53(1), 94–118. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022002708325942

11.

Bauer

Blattman

Chytilová

Henrich

Miguel

Mitts

(2016). Can war foster cooperation? The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 30(3), 249–274. https://doi.org/10.1257/jep.30.3.249

12.

Bilewicz

Liu

(2020). Collective victimhood as a form of adaptation. In Vollhardt

J. R.

(Ed.), The social psychology of collective victimhood (pp. 120–140). Oxford University Press.

13.

Bilewicz

Winiewski

Kofta

Wójcik

(2013). Harmful ideas: The structure and consequences of anti-semitic beliefs in poland. Political Psychology, 34(6), 821–839. https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12024

14.

Borensteina

Hedges

L. V.

Higgins

J. P.

Rothstein

H. R.

(2010). A basic introduction to fixed-effect and random-effects models for meta-analysis. Research Synthesis Methods, 1(2), 97–111. https://doi.org/10.1002/jrsm.12

15.

Bouchat

Licata

Rosoux

Allesch

Ammerer

Bovina

Bruckmüller

Cabecinhas

Chryssochoou

Cohrs

J. C.

Csertő

Delouvée

Durante

Ernst-Vintila

Flassbeck

Hilton

Kesteloot

Kislioglu

Krenn

Klein

(2017). A century of victimhood: Antecedents and current impacts of perceived suffering in World War I across Europe. European Journal of Social Psychology, 47(2), 195–208. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2232

16.

Cairns

Mallett

Lewis

Wilson

(2003). Who are the victims? Self-assessed victimhood and the Northern Irish conflict. Statistics and Research Branch of the Northern Ireland Office. Belfast, UK. (tech. rep. Northern Ireland Office Research & Statistical Series: Report No. 7).

17.

Canetti

Hirschberger

Rapaport

Elad-Strenger

Ein-Dor

Rosenzveig

Pyszczynski

Hobfoll

S. E.

(2018). Collective trauma from the lab to the real world: The effects of the Holocaust on contemporary Israeli political cognitions. Political Psychology, 39(1), 3–21. https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12384

18.

Chayinska

Kende

Wohl

M. J.

(2022). National identity and beliefs about historical linguicide are associated with support for exclusive language policies among the Ukrainian linguistic majority. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 25(4), 924–940. https://doi.org/10.1177/1368430220985911

19.

Cheung

M. W.

(2014). Modeling dependent effect sizes with three-level meta-analyses: A structural equation modeling approach. Psychological Methods, 19(2), 211–229. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0032968

20.

Cheung

M. W.

(2015a). Meta-analysis: A structural equation modeling approach. Wiley.

21.

Cheung

M. W.

(2015b). Metasem: An r package for meta-analysis using structural equation modeling. Frontiers in Psychology, 5(51521), 1–7. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.01521

22.

Cohrs

J. C.

McNeill

Vollhardt

J. R.

(2015). The two-sided role of inclusive victimhood for intergroup reconciliation: Evidence from northern Ireland. Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 21(4), 634–647. https://doi.org/10.1037/pac0000141

23.

Collier

Mahoney

J. E.

(1993). Conceptual “stretching”’ revisited: Adapting categories in comparative analysis. American Political Science Review, 87(4), 845–855. https://doi.org/10.2307/2938818

24.

Dinas

Fouka

Schläpfer

(2021). Family history and attitudes toward out-groups: Evidence from the european refugee crisis. The Journal of Politics, 83(2), 647–661. https://doi.org/10.1086/710016

25.

Druliolle

Brett

(2018). The politics of victimhood in post-conflict societies: Comparative and analytical perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan.

26.

Feinstein

Bonikowski

(2021). Nationalist narratives and anti-immigrant attitudes: Exceptionalism and collective victimhood in contemporary Israel. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 47(3), 741–761. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369183X.2019.1620596

27.

Franco

Malhotra

Simonovits

(2014). Publication bias in the social sciences: Unlocking the file drawer. Science, 345(6203), 1502–1505. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1255484

28.

Gerber

Green

D. P.

Nickerson

(2001). Testing for publication bias in political science. Political Analysis, 9(4), 385–392. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.pan.a004877

29.

Gerber

Malhotra

(2008). Do statistical reporting standards affect what is published? Publication bias in two leading political science journals. Quarterly Journal of Political Science, 3(3), 313–326. https://doi.org/10.1561/100.00008024

30.

Godefroidt

(2023). How terrorism does (and does not) affect citizens’ political attitudes: A meta-analysis. American Journal of Political Science, 67(1), 22–38. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12692

31.

Green

E. G.

Visintin

E. P.

Hristova

Bozhanova

Pereira

Staerklé

(2017). Collective victimhood and acknowledgement of outgroup suffering across history: Majority and minority perspectives. European Journal of Social Psychology, 47(2), 228–240. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2237

32.

Hirschberger

Ein-Dor

(2020). A temporal account of collective victimization as existential threat: Reconsidering adaptive and maladaptive responses. In Vollhardt

J. R.

(Ed.), The social psychology of collective victimhood (pp. 100–119). Oxford University Press.

33.

Hopkins

Dobai

(2020). Community members’ theorization of their collective victimization. In Vollhardt

J. R.

(Ed.), The social psychology of collective victimhood (pp. 186–207). Oxford University Press.

34.

Iyengar

Greenhouse

J. B.

(1988). Selection models and the file drawer problem. Statistical Science, 3 (1), 109–117. https://doi.org/10.1214/ss/1177013012

35.

Jasini

Delvaux

Mesquita

(2017). Collective victimhood and ingroup identity jointly shape intergroup relations, even in a non-violent conflict: The case of the Belgians. Psychologica Belgica, 57(3), 98–114. https://doi.org/10.5334/pb.334

36.

Klar

Schori-Eyal

Klar

(2013). The “never again” state of Israel: The emergence of the Holocaust as a core feature of Israeli identity and its four incongruent voices. Journal of Social Issues, 69(1), 125–143. https://doi.org/10.1111/josi.12007

37.

Kljajić

Shelef

vanderWilden

(2025). Replication data for: Collective victimhood beliefs and conflict-related attitudes: A meta-analysis. https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/UTPGMN

38.

Leach

C. W.

(2020). The unifying potential of an appraisal approach to the experience of group victimization. In Vollhardt

J. R.

(Ed.), The social psychology of collective victimhood (pp. 141–160). Oxford University Press.

39.

Lerner

A. B.

(2020). The uses and abuses of victimhood nationalism in international politics. European Journal of International Relations, 26(1), 62–87. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354066119850249

40.

Lerner

A. M.

(2021). Quantifying the archives: Leveraging the norms and tools of data science to conduct ethical research on the Holocaust. Holocaust Studies, 28(3), 358–376. https://doi.org/10.1080/17504902.2021.1979179

41.

Lerner

J. S.

Valdesolo

Kassam

K. S.

(2015). Emotion and decision making. Annual Review of Psychology, 66(1), 799–823. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurevpsych-010213-115043

42.

Leidner

Hirschberger

Park

(2023). From threat to challenge: Understanding the impact of historical collective trauma on contemporary intergroup conflict. Perspectives on Psychological Science: A Journal of the Association for Psychological Science, 18(1), 190–209. https://doi.org/10.1177/17456916221094540

43.

Leidner

Petrović

Prelic

(2021). Close or distant past? The role of temporal distance in responses to intergroup violence from victim and perpetrator perspectives. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 47(4), 657–672. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167220945890

44.

Liu

J. H.

Sibley

C. G.

Huang

L.-L.

(2014). History matters: Effects of culture-specific symbols on political attitudes and intergroup relations. Political Psychology, 35(1), 57–79. https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12027

45.

Luft

Subotić

(2024). Ethics of archives: Improving historical social science through the consideration of research on violence. Social Science History, 49(1), 229–253. https://doi.org/10.1017/ssh.2024.42

46.

Maoz

Eidelson

R. J.

(2007). Psychological bases of extreme policy preferences: How the personal beliefs of Israeli-Jews predict their support for population transfer in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. American Behavioral Scientist, 50(11), 1476–1497. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002764207302465

47.

Mashuri

Zaduqisti

Ula

(2017). A majority group’s perspective-taking towards a minority group: Its antecedents and impact on support for minority helping. Psychology & Developing Societies, 29(1), 44–73. https://doi.org/10.1177/0971333616689191

48.

Masterson

(2022). Humiliation and international conflict preferences. The Journal of Politics, 84(2), 874–888. https://doi.org/10.1086/715591

49.

Moss

(2020). The ethics of researching and writing about collective victimhood in postconflict societies. In The social psychology of collective victimhood (pp. 421–440). Oxford University Press.

50.

Nadler

Shnabel

(2015). Intergroup reconciliation: Instrumental and socioemotional processes and the needs-based model. European Review of Social Psychology, 26(1), 93–125. https://doi.org/10.1080/10463283.2015.1106712

51.

Noor

Brown

Gonzalez

Manzi

Lewis

C. A.

(2008a). On positive psychological outcomes: What helps groups with a history of conflict to forgive and reconcile with each other? Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 34(6), 819–832. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167208315555

52.

Noor

Brown

R. J.

Prentice

(2008b). Precursors and mediators of intergroup reconciliation in northern Ireland: A new model. British Journal of Social Psychology, 47(3), 481–495. https://doi.org/10.1348/014466607X238751

53.

Noor

Shnabel

Halabi

Nadler

(2012). When suffering begets suffering: The psychology of competitive victimhood between adversarial groups in violent conflicts. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 16(4), 351–374. https://doi.org/10.1177/1088868312440048

54.

Noor

Vollhardt

J. R.

Mari

Nadler

(2017). The social psychology of collective victimhood. European Journal of Social Psychology, 47(2), 121–134. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2300

55.

Obaidi

Bergh

Sidanius

Thomsen

(2018). The mistreatment of my people: Victimization by proxy and behavioral intentions to commit violence among Muslims in Denmark. Political Psychology, 39(3), 577–593. https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12435

56.

Paluck

E. L.

Porat

Clark

C. S.

Green

D. P.

(2021). Prejudice reduction: Progress and challenges. Annual Review of Psychology, 72(1), 533–560. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-071620-030619

57.

Paterson

J. L.

Brown

Walters

M. A.

(2019). Feeling for and as a group member: Understanding LGBT victimization via group-based empathy and intergroup emotions. British Journal of Social Psychology, 58(1), 211–224. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjso.12269

58.

Penić

Vollhardt

J. R.

Reicher

(2021). Reconciliation versus justice? It depends on the context: The role of symmetric and asymmetric violence in predicting postconflict attitudes. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 12(2), 202–212. https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550620915064

59.

Perez

M. J.

Salter

P. S.

Vollhardt

J. R.

(2020). A critical race reading of collective victimhood. In Vollhardt

J. R.

(Ed.), The social psychology of collective victimhood (pp. 319–336). Oxford University Press.

60.

Rosler

Branscombe

N. R.

(2020). Inclusivity of past collective trauma and its implications for current intractable conflict: The mediating role of moral lessons. British Journal of Social Psychology, 59(1), 171–188. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjso.12336

61.

Rupar

Bobowik

Arnoso

Vollhardt

J. R.

(2022). General inclusive victimhood predicts willingness to engage in intergroup contact: Findings from Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Basque Country. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 52(2), 71–84. https://doi.org/10.1111/jasp.12835

62.

Schori-Eyal

Klar

Ben-Ami

(2017). Perpetual ingroup victimhood as a distorted lens: Effects on attribution and categorization. European Journal of Social Psychology, 47(2), 180–194. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2250

63.

Shelef

N. G.

vanderWilden

(2024). Re-evaluating the impact of collective victimhood on conflict attitudes: Results from a natural experiment, a survey experiment, and panel study using israel’s holocaust memorial day. American Journal of Political Science, Online First, 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12906

64.

Shnabel

Belhassen

Mor

(2018). From victimhood to peace activism: The potential role of personal loss and inclusive victim beliefs. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 21(8), 1144–1154. https://doi.org/10.1177/1368430217699463

65.

Shnabel

Halabi

Noor

(2013). Overcoming competitive victimhood and facilitating forgiveness through re-categorization into a common victim or perpetrator identity. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 49(5), 867–877. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2013.04.007

66.

SimanTov-Nachlieli

Shnabel

Halabi

(2015). Winning the victim status can open conflicting groups to reconciliation: Evidence from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. European Journal of Social Psychology, 45(2), 139–145. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2091

67.

Slough

Tyson

S. A.

(2023). External validity and meta-analysis. American Journal of Political Science, 67(2), 440–455. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12742

68.

Staub

(2013). Building a peaceful society: Origins, prevention, and reconciliation after genocide and other group violence. American Psychologist, 68(7), 576–589. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0032045

69.

Sullivan

Landau

M. J.

Branscombe

N. R.

Rothschild

Z. K.

(2012). Competitive victimhood as a response to accusations of ingroup harm doing. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 102(4), 778–795. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0026573

70.

Szabó

Z. P.

(2020). Studied and understudied collective victim beliefs: What have we learned so far and what’s ahead? In The social psychology of collective victimhood (pp. 163–185). Oxford University Press.

71.

Szabó

Z. P.

Vollhardt

J. R.

Mészáros

N. Z.

(2020). Through the lens of history: The effects of beliefs about historical victimization on responses to refugees. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 74(1), 94–114. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijintrel.2019.10.009

72.

Tongeren

D. R. V.

Burnette

J. L.

O’Boyle

Worthington

E. L.

Forsyth

D. R.

(2014). A meta-analysis of intergroup forgiveness. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 9(1), 81–95. https://doi.org/10.1080/17439760.2013.844268

73.

Van den Noortgate

López-López

J. A.

Marín-Martínez

Sánchez-Meca

(2013). Three-level meta-analysis of dependent effect sizes. Behavior Research Methods, 45(2), 576–594. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-012-0261-6

74.

Volkan

V. D.

(2001). Transgenerational transmission and chosen traumas: An aspect of large-group identity. Group Analysis, 34(1), 79–97. https://doi.org/10.1177/05333160122077730

75.

Vollhardt

J. R.

(2009). The role of victim beliefs in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: Risk or potential for peace? Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 15(2), 135–159. https://doi.org/10.1080/10781910802544373

76.

Vollhardt

J. R.

(2013). “crime against humanity” or “crime against jews”? Acknowledgment in construals of the holocaust and its importance for intergroup relations. Journal of Social Issues, 69(1), 144–161. https://doi.org/10.1111/josi.12008

77.

Vollhardt

J. R.

(2015). Inclusive victim consciousness in advocacy, social movements, and intergroup relations: Promises and pitfalls. Social Issues and Policy Review, 9(1), 89–120. https://doi.org/10.1111/sipr.12011

78.

Vollhardt

J. R.

Bilali

(2015). The role of inclusive and exclusive victim consciousness in predicting intergroup attitudes: Findings from Rwanda, Burundi, and DRC. Political Psychology, 36(5), 489–506. https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12174

79.

Vollhardt

J. R.

Cohrs

J. C.

Szabó

Z. P.

Winiewski

Twali

M. S.

Hadjiandreou

McNeill

(2021a). The role of comparative victim beliefs in predicting support for hostile versus prosocial intergroup outcomes. European Journal of Social Psychology, 51(3), 505–524. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2756

80.

Vollhardt

J. R.

Jeong

H. Y.

Bilail

(2022). Reconciliation in the aftermath of collective violence. In The Cambridge handbook of political psychology (pp. 582–598). Cambridge University Press.

81.

Vollhardt

J. R.

Nair

Tropp

L. R.

(2016). Inclusive victim consciousness predicts minority group members’ support for refugees and immigrants. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 46(6), 354–368. https://doi.org/10.1111/jasp.12368

82.

Vollhardt

J. R.

Szabó

Z. P.

McNeill

Hadjiandreou

Winiewski

(2021b). Beyond comparisons: The complexity and context-dependency of collective victim beliefs. European Journal of Social Psychology, 51(7), 1138–1157. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2802

83.

Vollhardt

J. R.

Ünal

Nair

(2023). ‘you don’t compare horrors, you just don’t do that’: Examining assumptions and extending the scope of comparative victim beliefs. British Journal of Social Psychology, 62(1), 393–413. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjso.12554

84.

Wayne

Damann

T. J.

Fachter

(2023). The Holocaust, the socialization of victimhood and outgroup political attitudes in Israel. Comparative Political Studies, 0(0), 00104140231194068. https://doi.org/10.1177/00104140231194068

85.

Weiss

(2025). Beyond retraumatization: Trauma-informed political science research. British Journal of Political Science, 55(e82), 1–25. https://osf.io/preprints/osf/rvkspv1.

86.

Wohl

M. J. A.

Branscombe

N. R.

Reysen

(2010). Perceiving your group’s future to be in jeopardy: Extinction threat induces collective angst and the desire to strengthen the ingroup. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 36(7), 898–910. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167210372505

87.

Young

I. F.

Sullivan

(2016). Competitive victimhood: A review of the theoretical and empirical literature. Current Opinion in Psychology, 11(Intergroup relations), 30–34. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2016.04.004

88.

Zagefka

Pehrson

Mole

R. C. M.

Chan

(2010). The effect of essentialism in settings of historic intergroup atrocities. European Journal of Social Psychology, 40(5), 718–732. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.639

Supplementary Material

Please find the following supplemental material available below.

For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.

For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.

0.00 MB

0.49 MB