Catherine E. Amiot

Integration of social identities in the self: Toward a cognitive-developmental model

This article presents a model of social identity development and integration in the self. Classic intergroup theories (e.g., social identity theory, self-categorization theory) address the situational, short-term changes in social identities. Although these theories identify the contextual and environmental factors that explain situational changes in social identification, the intraindividual processes underlying developmental changes in social identities and their integration within the self remain to be identified. Relying on recent intergroup models as well as on developmental (i.e., neo-Piagetian) and social cognitive frameworks, this article proposes a four-stage model that explains the specific processes by which multiple social identities develop intraindividually and become integrated within the self over time. The factors that facilitate versus impede these identity change processes and the consequences associated with social identity integration are also presented.

A Longitudinal Investigation of Coping Processes During a Merger: Implications for Job Satisfaction and Organizational Identification

This study tested the utility of a stress and coping model of employee adjustment to a merger. Two hundred and twenty employees completed both questionnaires (Time 1: 3 months after merger implementation; Time 2: 2 years later). Structural equation modeling analyses revealed that positive event characteristics predicted greater appraisals of self-efficacy and less stress at Time 1. Self-efficacy, in turn, predicted greater use of problem-focused coping at Time 2, whereas stress predicted a greater use of problem-focused and avoidance coping. Finally, problem-focused coping predicted higher levels of job satisfaction and identification with the merged organization (Time 2), whereas avoidance coping predicted lower identification.

Passion and Psychological Adjustment: A Test of the Person-Environment Fit Hypothesis

Passion represents a strong inclination toward an activity that is important, liked, and in which significant time is invested. Although a harmonious passion is well integrated in one’s identity and is emitted willingly, obsessive passion is not well integrated and is emitted out of internal pressure. This study tested for the presence of a Passion × Environment fit interaction with respect to psychological adjustment. Elite hockey players (N = 233) who tried out for a team in a highly competitive league participated in this short-term longitudinal study. As hypothesized, being selected by the highly competitive leagues led to higher psychological adjustment than not being selected by such leagues. Two months later, an interaction revealed that among athletes who were playing in highly competitive leagues, obsessively passionate athletes reported higher psychological adjustment than did harmonious athletes. Conversely, among athletes playing in less competitive leagues, harmonious athletes reported higher psychological adjustment than did obsessive athletes.

Status, equity and social identification during an intergroup merger: A longitudinal study

Using an intergroup perspective, this longitudinal study (N=215) examined the adjustment patterns of employees from low vs. high status pre-merger organizations. The first questionnaire was distributed 3 months after the implementation of the merger, whereas the second was completed 2 years later. As predicted, members of the low status group perceived the merger to be implemented in a less fair manner at the start of the merger and reported a decreased adjustment to the merger over time. Members of the high status group showed an increase in adjustment over time, lower in-group bias and a stronger identification with the new merged organization. Path analyses further confirmed that identification with the new merged organization mediated the associations between perceptions of fairness and in-group bias as well as changes in adjustment over time. With its longitudinal design, this study replicates and extends past results by revealing the predictors of adjustment for members of low vs. high status groups involved in an intergroup merger.

The self in change: A longitudinal investigation of coping and self-determination processes

On the basis of theoretical work on self-determination, coping, and the self, this study aimed at understanding the role of both structural and flexible self variables in the process of adapting to change, and the consequences of this adaptation process. It was hypothesized that, in a changing situation, global self-determination, as a structural aspect of the self, would predict the coping strategies used to deal with this life change. Coping, in turn, was hypothesized to represent an adaptation process mediating the associations between global self-determination and various consequences. The consequences investigated included changes in psychological well-being and in flexible aspects of the self (i.e., new identity, contextual self-determined motivation). Using a three-wave design, this study tested these hypotheses among students experiencing the transition to university. Results obtained through structural equation modeling involving true change procedures provided support for most of the anticipated associations.

Toward a Psychology of Human-Animal Relations

Nonhuman animals are ubiquitous to human life, and permeate a diversity of social contexts by providing humans with food and clothing, serving as participants in research, improving healing, and offering entertainment, leisure, and companionship. Despite the impact that animals have on human lives and vice versa, the field of psychology has barely touched upon the topic of human-animal relations as an important domain of human activity. We review the current state of research on human-animal relations, showing how this body of work has implications for a diverse range of psychological themes including evolutionary processes, development, normative factors, gender and individual differences, health and therapy, and intergroup relations. Our aim is to highlight human-animal relations as a domain of human life that merits theoretical and empirical attention from psychology as a discipline.

Changes in social identities over time: The role of coping and adaptation processes

The present studies investigated the processes by which group members integrate a new social identity. Based on a newly developed theoretical model, we anticipated that social factors (social support and need satisfaction) would be facilitators of this change process and should have an impact on the coping and adaptation strategies group members use to deal with the membership in a new group. These strategies, in turn, should predict intra-individual changes in level of identification with the new group, which should then predict enhanced psychological adjustment over time. The proposed associations were tested among university students over the course of their first academic year (Study 1) and among on-line gamers joining a newly established on-line community (Study 2). Path analyses provided support for the hypothesized associations. The results are discussed in light of recent theoretical developments pertaining to intra-individual changes in social identities.

The Social Validation and Coping Model of Organizational Identity Development A Longitudinal Test

Considerable research has explored the variables that affect the success of newcomer on-boarding, socialization, and retention. We build on this research by examining how newcomer socialization is affected by the degree to which newcomers’ peers and leaders provide them with positive feedback. We refer to newcomers’ perceptions of this feedback as “social validation.” This study examines the impact of social validation from peers and leaders on the development of organizational identification over time and the turnover attitudes of new employees. We found that perceptions of social validation significantly predicted how new employees used coping strategies to adapt to their new role over time, and consequently the development of identification and turnover intentions. Specifically, increased peer social validation predicted a greater use of positive coping strategies to engage with the new organization over time, and less use of disengagement coping strategies. In contrast, initial leader validation decreased newcomers’ disengagement from the organization over time. These results highlight the role of the social environment in the workplace in temporally shaping and validating newcomers’ adaptation efforts during transitions.

The influence of group membership and individual differences in psychopathy and perspective taking on neural responses when punishing and rewarding others

Understanding how neural processes involved in punishing and rewarding others are altered by group membership and personality traits is critical in order to gain a better understanding of how socially important phenomena such as racial and group biases develop. Participants in an fMRI study (n = 48) gave rewards (money) or punishments (electroshocks) to in‐group or out‐group members. The results show that when participants rewarded others, greater activation was found in regions typically associated with receiving rewards such as the striatum and medial orbitofrontal cortex, bilaterally. Activation in those regions increased when participants rewarded in‐group compared to out‐group members. Punishment led to increased activation in regions typically associated with Theory of Mind including the medial prefrontal cortex and posterior superior temporal sulcus, as well as regions typically associated with perceiving others in pain such as the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, anterior insula and lateral orbitofrontal cortex. Interestingly, in contrast to the findings regarding reward, activity in these regions was not moderated by whether the target of the punishment was an in‐ or out‐group member. Additional regression analysis revealed that participants who have low perspective taking skills and higher levels of psychopathy showed less activation in the brain regions identified when punishing others, especially when they were out‐group members. In sum, when an individual is personally responsible for delivering rewards and punishments to others, in‐group bias is stronger for reward allocation than punishments, marking the first neuroscientific evidence of this dissociation. Hum Brain Mapp 35:4989–4999, 2014.

Discrimination and the Positive-Negative Asymmetry Effect: Ideological and Normative Processes

Research using the minimal group paradigm demonstrates that categorization and ingroup identification can foster intergroup discrimination. However, the positive-negative asymmetry effect shows that less discrimination occurs when negative rather than positive outcomes are distributed. The normative hypothesis explains this asymmetry by the stronger inappropriateness of discrimination in negative than in positive outcome distributions. Results obtained in this minimal group paradigm study (N = 257) did not replicate the asymmetry effect: discrimination occurred in both positive and negative outcome distributions, even if norms against discrimination were stronger in negative than in positive outcome distributions. The absence of the asymmetry effect is explained by the effect of the discrimination-justifying ideology.