Social dominance orientation and climate change

Personality and Individual Differences 86 (2015) 108–111

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Social dominance orientation and climate change denial: The role of dominance and system justification☆ Kirsti M. Jylhä ⁎, Nazar Akrami Department of Psychology, Uppsala University, Sweden

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history: Received 4 March 2015 Received in revised form 28 May 2015 Accepted 30 May 2015 Available online xxxx Keywords: Climate change denial Nature dominance Social dominance orientation System justification Domineering Empathy

a b s t r a c t Extending previous research, we examined whether the relation between social dominance orientation (SDO) and climate change denial reflects group-based dominance (SDO and nature dominance) or general system justification. Moreover, we examined whether the relation between personality (domineering and empathy) and denial is mediated by group-based dominance variables. The results showed that the group-based dominance variables reduce the effect of system justification on denial to nonsignificant. Also, social dominance and nature dominance explain unique parts of the variance in denial. Moreover, path analyses showed that the relations between empathy and system justification with denial are mediated by both of the group-based dominance variables, while the relation between domineering and denial is mediated only by SDO. Together, these results suggest that denial is driven partly by dominant personality and low empathy, and partly by motivation to justify and promote existing social and human-nature hierarchies. We conclude by suggesting that climate change mitigation efforts could be more successful if framed as being clearly beneficial for everybody and nonthreatening to existing social order. © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction It is today considered to be certain that human-produced greenhouse gases are causing changes in the climate system (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC] et al., 2014). According to climate scientists, the progression of climate change cannot be stopped any more at this point but it can be mitigated. Mitigation efforts are argued to be crucial if we are to prevent the most severe, widespread and irreversible impacts on people and ecosystems (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC] et al., 2014). Thus far, efforts to reduce greenhouse gases have been inadequate (Burck, Marten, & Bals, 2014). One reason for this inadequacy is that evidence regarding climate change is still disputed or denied by many (O'Connor, Bord, & Fisher, 1999; Sibley & Kurz, 2013). Recent research has found a relation between climate change denial and social dominance orientation (SDO, Häkkinen & Akrami, 2014; Milfont, Richter, Sibley, Wilson, & Fischer, 2013). The aim of the present paper is to illuminate the character of this relation. SDO is an individual difference variable measuring preference for group-based social hierarchies (Pratto, Sidanius, Stallworth, & Malle, 1994). Specifically, SDO has been suggested to measure passive justification as well as aggressive promotion of social inequalities and ☆ The Swedish Research Council supported this research by grant (2011–1891) to Nazar Akrami. The authors thank an anonymous reviewer, Jana Grina, and Jarkko Rautiainen for their valuable comments on previous draft of this paper. ⁎ Corresponding author at: Department of Psychology, Uppsala University, P.O. Box 1225, SE-751 42 Uppsala, Sweden. E-mail address: [email protected] (K.M. Jylhä).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2015.05.041 0191-8869/© 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

hierarchies (Jost & Thompson, 2000). High SDO individuals tend to find hierarchies to be inevitable and legitimate because of their predisposition to perceive the world as a “competitive jungle” (Duckitt, 2001). It should be noted that, as a measure, SDO does not include direct reference to nature or environmental issues. Thus, the relation between SDO and environmentalism could reflect acceptance of anti-environmental actions that maintain or enhance social hierarchies. Supporting this proposal, Milfont and Sibley (2014) showed that SDO predicts supportive attitudes towards environmental utilization when the outcome of utilization is framed as hierarchy-enhancing (i.e., generating further benefits for the high-status groups) but not when the outcome is framed as hierarchy-attenuating (i.e., benefiting the whole community). Correspondingly, it is possible that the SDO-denial relation reflects a motivation to maintain prevailing hierarchical social structures, which could change if more focus is placed on climate change mitigation. Importantly, however, recent research suggests that individuals expressing high SDO also tend to support group-based dominance in human-nature relations (Dhont, Hodson, Costello, & MacInnis, 2014; Milfont et al., 2013). This suggests that these individuals consider humans to be a superior group holding a legitimate right to dominate the rest of the ecosystem. Such a view could explain why SDO is related to denial. Specifically, individuals who consider human dominance over nature to be natural could be unwilling to admit human-induced climate change. However, from the current state of knowledge it is unclear whether the relation between SDO and denial reflects motivation to defend the social status quo (including hierarchies), acceptance of nature dominance, or dominance per se.

K.M. Jylhä, N. Akrami / Personality and Individual Differences 86 (2015) 108–111

Previous research has shown that endorsement of status quo predicts anti-environmentalism. For example, Feygina, Jost, and Goldsmith (2010) found denial of environmental problems to be correlated with system justification — a motivational tendency to accept and protect the status quo (Jost & Banaji, 1994). That is, viewing current societal practices as legitimate also implies denying negative impact that our lifestyle has on the environment. Moreover, Feygina et al. (2010) demonstrated that system justification partly mediates the relation between political conservative ideology and environmental denial which has been found in previous studies (e.g., McCright & Dunlap, 2011). It should be noted that Feygina et al. (2010) used selected facets of a widely used measure for environmental attitudes (the New Environmental Paradigm scale; Dunlap, Van Liere, Mertig, & Jones, 2000) to operationalize environmental denial. These selected facets can be considered as measures of denial of environmental problems in general, but not denial of climate change in particular. However, these two forms of denial share similarities, as they both refer to dismissive attitudes when it comes to negative impacts that humans have on environment. Thus, system justification can be expected to correlate also with climate change denial. Existing group-based hierarchies are a part of status quo and, not surprisingly, system justification and conservative ideology correlate with SDO (Wilson & Sibley, 2013; Jost & Thompson, 2000). In fact, SDO has even been used as a measure of system justification in some previous research (Jost & Burgess, 2000). However, SDO specifically represents views concerning hierarchies, being conceptually and empirically distinct from system justification which represents acceptance of the system in general. Therefore, these two constructs provide a possibility to study which component of status quo acceptance explains denial better. Perhaps the relation between system justification and denial does not reflect acceptance of the contemporary system in general, but acceptance of group-based hierarchies in particular. This possibility has not been investigated in previous research. However, it is supported by findings showing SDO to be a better predictor of denial compared to ideologies related to general resistance to change, such as right-wing authoritarianism and left-right political orientation (Häkkinen & Akrami, 2014; Milfont et al., 2013). There are some personality traits that predispose for an inclination to accept hierarchical group relations. For example, previous research has found that SDO is predicted by (low) empathy (e.g., Duckitt & Sibley, 2010; Pratto et al., 1994), and there is also evidence for reciprocal relation between these two variables (Sidanius et al., 2013). Importantly, empathy has also been shown to be related with environmental behavior and attitudes (see Tam, 2013). While the relation of empathy with denial has not been examined in previous research, it is reasonable to expect such a relation, at least when people are not seriously affected by climate change themselves. That is, individuals with low levels of empathy could score higher on denial because they are not concerned for those affected by possible negative consequences of climate change. Another personality trait that should be studied in relation to SDO is domineering (Grina, Akrami, & Bergh, in preparation). Domineering reflects a general need for power and the tendency to be controlling, dominant, and forceful in interpersonal relationships (Goldberg, 1999). Domineering was recently found to be related to SDO (Grina et al., in preparation) and it is reasonable to assume some link to denial. Dominant individuals may actively deny climate change because they do not want to risk their power position in relation to other people and nature. 2. Aim and rationale The first aim of this research is to illuminate the relation between SDO and climate change denial by investigating whether it reflects acceptance of status quo in general (i.e., system justification), or of group-based dominance in particular (i.e., SDO and nature dominance). Here, we expect that including SDO and nature dominance in the equation would significantly reduce the effect of system justification

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on denial (cf. Häkkinen & Akrami, 2014; Milfont et al., 2013). Following this line of reasoning, we thus expect SDO and nature dominance to mediate the relation between system justification and denial. Also, aiming to understand the role of group-based dominance variables (SDO and nature dominance), we test their unique contributions in predicting denial. This would enable us to estimate the impact of social versus nature attitudes on denial. Moreover, persisting to maintain status quo (as expressed in SDO and system justification), in spite of anticipated severe consequences of climate change, could reflect domineering personality and low empathy — traits that are strong predictors of SDO. Thus, as the second aim, we test the predication of group-based dominance variables mediating the effect of these traits on denial. Based on the predictions above, we propose a path model where empathy, domineering, and system justification affect SDO and nature dominance which in turn affect climate change denial (see Fig. 1). To deal with the mediations predicted above, we also test models with direct paths from system justification, domineering, and empathy to denial. 3. Method 3.1. Participants The sample consisted of 221 participants (aged between 18 and 72 years, M = 28.45, SD = 10.78, 66% women) who were recruited by announces on a webpage, notice boards and face-to-face. 3.2. Materials and procedure Climate change denial was measured by a sixteen-item scale (Häkkinen & Akrami, 2014; see Appendix A). The scale captures different forms of denial, such as denial of human impact and denial of seriousness of climate change. Social dominance orientation was measured by the SDO7 scale comprising sixteen items (Ho et al., 2012; item example: It's probably a good thing that certain groups are at the top and other groups are at the bottom). Nature dominance was operationalized by a three-item anti-anthropocentrism subscale of the new environmental paradigm (Dunlap et al., 2000; item example: Humans were meant to rule over the rest of nature) and three items from the human supremacy beliefs-scale (Items 1, 2, 4, Dhont & Hodson, 2014: item example: Animals are inferior to humans). These items were combined into one scale to measure dominance over environment and animals. System justification was assessed by an eight-item general system justification scale adopted from Kay and Jost (2003). Factor analysis of this scale revealed two factors; one reflecting endorsement of the Swedish society per se (item example: Sweden is the best country in the world to live in) and another reflecting endorsement of the system/society in general (item example: In general, I find society to be fair). The four items loading on the latter mentioned factor were adopted for further analyses. Also, one reversed scored item from the other factor was included in order to balance the scale. Domineering was assessed by a six-item scale (http://ipip.ori.org/ipip/; Goldberg, 1999; item example: I insist that others do things my way), and empathy was measured by a seven-item empathic concern subscale of the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (Davis, 1980; item example: I would describe myself as a pretty soft-hearted person). The items of empathic concern were responded to on a Likert-like scale ranging from 1 (absolutely not true) to 5 (absolutely true) while other items were responded to on a scale ranging from 1 (do not agree at all) to 5 (agree fully). The study was completed online in approximately 40 min. The questionnaire included other scales which are not related to the present study (to be reported elsewhere). Participants were explicitly informed that data was collected anonymously and that they were free to discontinue the study at any time without giving any reason. Participants received a cinema voucher as reward (approximately 12 €).

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Fig. 1. Standardized structural relations explaining climate change denial (only significant, [p b .05] paths are depicted).

4. Results Correlation analyses revealed significant relations between all variables, with a couple of exceptions. Some of the correlations did not reach conventional significance levels and the correlation between empathy and system justification was nonsignificant. For the correlations and mean scores, see Table 1. To test our hypotheses, we conducted path analyses using robust maximum likelihood (MLR) estimator in Mplus (Mplus 7.3, Muthén & Muthén, 2012). First, we ran a simple model with SDO and system justification as predictors of denial. In this model the path from SDO to denial was significant (β = .34, p b .001) while that from system justification to denial was not (β = .11, p = .11). The model explained 15% of the variance in denial. In the next step, we extended this model by introducing nature dominance as an independent variable. In this model, SDO (β = .31, p b .001) was the strongest predictor of denial, followed by nature dominance (β = .22, p = .001). Again, the effect of system justification was not significant (β = .07, p = .31). This model explained 19% of the variance in denial. These results suggest that the relation between system justification and denial is reduced to nonsignificant when the group-based dominance variables are entered in the equation. This also supports our prediction that the relation between system justification and denial might be mediated by group-based dominance variables. Testing the proposed model, we ran a model with paths from domineering, empathy and system justification to the group-based dominance variables and from both of these variables to climate change denial. We also let SDO and nature dominance to correlate. This model showed excellent fit to the data, χ2(3) = 2.11, p = .55, CFI = 1.00, RMSEA = .00, 90% CI [.00, .10], and SRMR = .02. All paths were significant, except the path from domineering to nature dominance (β = .07, p = .33) and the correlation between SDO and nature dominance

Table 1 Basic statistics for the variables. Variable

r

M

1 1. Climate change denial 2. Nature dominance 3. Social dominance orientation 4. System justification 5. Domineering 6. Empathy

2

3

4

.90 .30⁎ .37⁎

5

SD

6 1.88 0.68

.77 .22⁎

.85

2.38 0.89 1.99 0.62

.20⁎ .25⁎ .26⁎ .68 2.69 0.77 .11† .13† .42⁎ .11† .73 2.59 0.74 ⁎ ⁎ ⁎ ⁎ −.16 −.17 −.34 −.03 −.24 .82 3.90 0.70

Cronbach's alphas in the diagonal (italics). ⁎ p b .05 (two-tailed). † p b .10 (two-tailed).

(β = .10, p = .17), see Fig. 1. As the simpler model presented above, this model explained 19% of the variance in denial. In addition to the model above, we ran alternative models where we removed the nonsignificant paths and introduced direct effects to denial either from empathy, domineering or system justification. In these models none of the direct paths was significant (βs = − .02, − .06, and .07, respectively). The models had good fit (χ2/df; 1.2, 1.1 and 1.0, respectively) but did not outperform the original model presented above. Further, we ran other alternative models to account for, for example, the possibility that SDO is not necessarily an effect of empathy but it could also be vice versa (Sidanius et al., 2013). Here, we shifted the place of SDO with empathy (χ2/df = 7.20) or the order of both mediating (SDO and nature dominance) and independent (empathy, system justification and domineering) variables (χ2/df = 6.70). Also, we ran our main model (see Fig. 1) but placed empathy between SDO and denial (χ2/df = 4.56). These alternative models, which also included several nonsignificant paths, provide a poorer fit than our main model (χ2/df = 0.70). Together, the results indicate that group based dominance variables mediate the relations between empathy, domineering or system justification with denial. Also, the effects of SDO and nature dominance on denial are comparable although the effect of SDO was higher (see Fig. 1). Interestingly, when we set the path from SDO to denial to zero in the main model, the model explained 9% of the variance in denial. Setting the path from nature dominance to denial to zero resulted in a model explaining 14% of the variance. These results show that SDO, compared to nature dominance, seem to have the upper hand when explaining denial. Nevertheless, these results suggest that SDO and nature dominance provide unique contributions in explaining denial. 5. Discussion This study was conducted in order to investigate the relation between SDO and climate change denial that has been found in previous research (e.g., Häkkinen & Akrami, 2014). The first aim was to test if this relation reflects system justification or group-based dominance. We found support for the hypothesis that group-based dominance variables (i.e., SDO and nature dominance) better predict denial compared to system justification. Further, both SDO and nature dominance explained unique parts of variance in denial, SDO being the stronger predictor. Hence, when it comes to views concerning hierarchies, denial seems to reflect both social and nature-related attitudes. In combination with previous findings (Häkkinen & Akrami, 2014; Milfont et al., 2013) these results suggest that SDO is a primary socio-political ideological variable predicting denial. Also, the results showed that system justification predicts denial through group-based dominance variables. This suggests that the previously found relation between system justification and denial (Feygina et al., 2010) predominantly reflects views concerning group-based hierarchies. Thus, climate change seems to be


disputed due to motivation to protect social as well as human-nature hierarchies at least with the set of variables used in the present study. However, the present study was conducted in a country with relatively environmental-friendly social norms (Ojala, 2015), which could explain why general system justification did not contribute to denial uniquely beyond SDO. Hence, the relation of denial with these two ideological variables could vary as a function of cultural context. To advance our understanding of the relation between SDO and denial, we also examined personality underpinnings of this relation. It was suggested that domineering individuals may deny climate change because they do not want to risk their power position, while those low in empathy may deny because they are not concerned for people and animals affected by possible negative consequences of climate change. As expected, these personality traits did indeed correlate with denial, and the relations were mediated by SDO. However, nature dominance mediated the effect of empathy only. These relations should be studied further, as they indicate that social dominance and nature dominance have partially different underpinnings. Perhaps, nature dominance is a form of dominance that is taken for granted by many of us and is thus not much underpinned by domineering. Social dominance, however, seems to capture both low empathy and dominance. On the other hand, it is possible that our naturedominance scale did not capture dominance, at least as it is expressed in domineering scale. The results of this study clarify how group-based dominance, system justification, and personality relate to each other and manifest in environmental domain. We are first to examine a model that integrates this set of variables to predict climate change denial. Notably, the simpler model including only the group-based dominance variables explained the same amount of variance as the full model. However, while the simpler model could guide research when it comes to the most important variables, the full model provides theoretical insights when it comes to a chain of variables explaining denial. Answering a couple, our model also leads to some new questions, for example, whether the examined relations indeed are causal. Nevertheless, the implications of our results are of importance, particularly when considering that the groups holding low hierarchical positions are also most acutely affected by anticipated climate change consequences (IPCC, 2014). For instance, underprivileged people and nations, as well as non-human animals, have difficulties adapting to the changing climate for various reasons. Also, these groups have fewer possibilities to mitigate climate change. Thus, it is particularly those who are better off who need to (and can) change their behavior. Future studies are needed in order to find out strategies affecting denial among high-dominance and low-empathy individuals. Possibly, mitigation efforts could be framed so that they are perceived to not pose a threat to existing social order and as clearly beneficial for everybody. Appendix A. Supplementary data Supplementary data to this article can be found online at http://dx. doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2015.05.041. References Burck, J., Marten, F., & Bals, C. (2014). The climate change performance index 2015. Germanwatch (Retrieved 22 January, from: https://germanwatch.org/en/download/ 10407.pdf). Davis, M. H. (1980). A multidimensional approach to individual differences in empathy. JSAS Catalog of Selected Documents in Psychology, 10, 85.

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