I am not an animal—I am an American: Disassociation from animals and importance of cultural group identity

Abstract

Terror Management Theory suggests that cultural identities and worldviews allow people to mitigate existential concerns and distance themselves from other mortal animals. We theorized that individuals low in the perceived similarity of self to animals (PSSA) are more likely to invest in their ingroup cultural identities and have negative attitudes toward other cultures, especially after mortality salience (MS). Congruently, we found that participants scoring lower on PSSA rated their ingroup identity as more important and had less inclusive and more negative views of outgroups than individuals reporting high PSSA (Study 1, Samples A–D). After MS, participants scoring lower on PSSA were more likely to defend their cultural-worldview (Studies 2–3 and 6) and exhibited more negative attitudes toward outgroups (Studies 4–5). High-PSSA individuals exhibited more positive attitudes toward outgroups after MS (Studies 4–5). We discuss the implications of these findings for the study of group identity and intergroup conflicts.