Psychology of Authoritarian Populism Flashcards
Tendency to see outgroup members as “less than
human.” Leads to a failure to acknowledge others’
experience and agency.
Dehumanization
An individual taken as a source of information; often a
member of one’s own group
Epistemic Authority
Subjective sense of belonging to a social category;
measurable by such questions as “To what extent do you
identify as…?”
Group Membership
The tendency to see one’s own group as superior to
others in traits, opinions, and status
In-Group Favoritism/Intergroup bias
Tendency for people to privilege members of their own
group and denigrate those of other groups. Can take
place either at the conscious or subconscious level
Intergroup bias
Phenomenon whereby people prefer to receive resources
that are relatively rather than objectively superior
Maximum Differentiation
The smallest piece of information necessary to induce
group-based effects
Minimal Groups
The act of determining others’ intentions and desires
through social cues
Motivational Inference
Emphasizing different strengths of different parties to
reduce competitiveness and bias in intergroup setting
Mutual Differentiation
Tendency to view outgroup members as possessing
similar characteristics
Outgroup Homogeneity
State of insecurity regarding physical or psychological
wellbeing
Perceived Threat
Tendency for people to discount opinions and beliefs on
the basis of the identity of their proponents
Reactive Devaluation
Revising one’s opinions about a group/individual by
assigning them to a different conceptual group
Recategorization
The psychological sense of deprivation; known to
exacerbate intergroup bias
Scarcity
Theory suggesting that human reason evolved to win
arguments not track truth
Argumentative Theory
Consequence of cognitive dissonance whereby people
demonstrate unwillingness to change their minds in the
face of countervailing evidence
Attitude Inflexibility
The psychologically aversive experience of holding two
contradictory views at the same time
Cognitive Dissonance
The tendency to search and attend to only that evidence
which corroborates one’s views
Confirmation Bias
Cognitive bias whereby the lower someone’s ability on a
task, the greater their tendency to overestimate that ability. Or Tendency for people to feel they understand complex
phenomena with far greater precision than they actually do
Dunning-Kruger Effect
Mental shortcuts that people use to arrive at judgments
and decisions
Heuristics
Credits obtained in the eyes of one’s community for
conforming to group norms
Moral Credentials
The state of being unable to rationally justify one’s moral
intuitions
Moral Dumbfounding
Phenomenon whereby people feel they have “done their
duty” after a trivial moral contribution and are thereby
absolved from further action
Moral Satiation
Tendency to bend one’s belief to suit one’s internal
desires and motivations
Motivated Reasoning
