Umeå University's logo

According to scapegoat theory, individuals tend to attribute personal or social problems to an out-group (real or imagined). This self-serving bias protects the ego or social identity from responsibility while increasing prejudice towards the out-group blamed for feelings of frustration. In this research note, we test this theory using five waves of the Czech Household Panel Study (CHPS 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020), which captures the tail end of the 2015–2016 refugee crisis in Europe through the lockdown in response to COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. We focus attention on both personal and professional domains, asking if factors like subjective health, work stress, relationship dissatisfaction, life dissatisfaction, and unhappiness contribute to attitudes towards immigrants over time. We also ask whether socio-political attitudes such as distrust in the government, social distrust, and political disinterest are associated with changes in anti-immigrant sentiment. Results show that personal and professional domains help explain between-individual differences in attitudes towards immigrants, while trust in the government and society are related to both within-individual change and between-individual differences in anti-immigrant sentiment.

While classmates have been identified as important socializing agents in relation to adolescents’ prejudice, there is limited understanding of how popularity status plays into classroom transmission of prejudicial attitudes. Drawing on theories of social influence, we used a three-wave panel of Swedish adolescents (N = 941, aged 13–15) to examine the role of sociometric and prestige popular classmates in the development of adolescents’ anti-immigrant attitudes. Multilevel repeated measurement models revealed positive relationships between popular and individual prejudice; between sociometric prejudice and the level and rate of change; and between prestige prejudice and wave-to-wave shifts in individual prejudice. Overall, we found sociometrically popular classmates to be more influential in relation to adolescents’ prejudice. Additionally, we found the effect of sociometric prejudice to be more pronounced if political issues were frequently discussed in the classroom.

Although political radicalism is one of the major societal threats, we have limited understanding of how it is formed. While there are reasons to expect that harassment experienced in adolescence increase the propensity for radicalism, this relationship has not yet been investigated. This five-wave study of Swedish adolescents (N = 892) examined the role of peer harassment in radical political behavior. The results revealed that within-person fluctuations in harassment were positively related to fluctuations in radicalism. Individual-level (but not class-level) harassment also predicted differences between adolescents: youth who experienced more harassment had higher levels of and a more pronounced decrease in radicalism. In addition, adolescents who had more supportive teachers or parents were less affected by harassment than youth with less-supportive adults. The findings suggest that personal experiences of harassment increase the risk of radicalism but supportive relationships can mitigate their negative consequences.

Although previous research has shown that deliberative discussions have consequences for intergroup attitudes, very little is known about this impact during the formative adolescent years. In addition, the mechanism explaining the mechanism through which discussions affect intergroup attitudes is not clear. This 3-wave study of Swedish adolescents (N = 892, 51.1% girls, MageT1 = 13.41, nested in 35 classrooms) examined the role of teacher-initiated political discussions in the classroom for the development of youth attitudes toward immigrants. The results of multilevel analysis showed that adolescents who perceived political discussions to be less frequent increased in anti-immigrant attitudes compared to youth with more frequent discussions. Similarly, classrooms with less deliberative atmosphere were more negative toward immigrants than classrooms with a higher frequency of discussions, and this effect remained two years after the students moved to new schools. Mediation analysis revealed that general political interest (but not news consumption) explained the effects of classroom discussions on attitudes: Youth who perceived that their teachers frequently initiate political discussions developed higher general political interest and, in turn, lower anti-immigrant attitudes than youth with less frequent discussions. The findings show an important role of classroom political discussions for the formation of intergroup attitudes in adolescence. The findings suggest that frequent discussions reduce the risk of prejudice development by stimulating youth general political interest.

Public support for government institutions tends to increase in the face of threats such as armed conflict, terrorism, or natural disasters. This phenomenon, known as the 'rally-'round-the-flag' effect, has also been observed as a response to the Covid-19 pandemic in many countries. Citizens' trust in the government's good intentions and ability to handle a crisis is very important, as it gives government the legitimacy to take strong measures. High trust in government also increases citizens' willingness to comply with these measures. The aim of this study is to examine the 'rally-'round-the-flag' effect in the Czech Republic, analyse the characteristics related to the increase in trust in government, and test the relationship between trust in government and compliance with anti-pandemic measures. The analysis uses data from five waves of the Czech Household Panel Study (2016-2020) and finds a dramatic increase in trust in government in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. A relatively higher increase in trust in government was observed among people with a low level of education and low social trust. Overall, however, the rise in trust in government is more of a general tendency across society than it is an increase in one specific group of the population. Trust in government is also linked to compliance with anti-pandemic measures.

Anti-immigrant attitudes are associated with many social problems and reduction of negative attitudes toward immigrants is one of many actions which can assist in preventing these problems, promote better relations within society, and subsequently, create a better quality of life. School is one of the environments that provide opportunity to reduce anti-immigrant attitudes by implementing curriculums that require teachers to encourage discussions on the issue of immigrants and immigration. Previous research has shown that political discussions have positive effect on development of anti-immigrant attitudes. However, there has been little research on classroom political discussions. Using Czech High School Survey panel data (N = 902; 53 classrooms) that include information from adolescents and their civics teachers, this study examines the role of classroom political discussions on the development of adolescents’ anti-immigrant attitudes. The results show that adolescents experiencing classroom political discussions more often have lower levels of anti-immigrant attitudes than adolescents that are exposed to discussions less frequently. Furthermore, adolescents from classrooms that discussed immigration during their civics classes also report less negative anti-immigrant attitudes. Additionally, moderation analyses reveal that more frequent political discussions reduce anti-immigrant attitudes for those who experienced on average longer political discussions and those that discussed immigration during their civics classes. These findings support the argument for enforcing school discussions on various political topics because as results of this article suggest, classroom discussions have positive impact on how adolescents view immigrants if discussed frequently and thoroughly and may in turn reduce the negative consequences associated with anti-immigrant attitudes.

Income redistribution and changes in redistributive policies are highly contested issues that often have a bearing on societal debate and electoral competition. Using European Social Survey data, we trace trends in public attitudes toward income redistribution in 18 European countries from 2002 to 2019, a time period which included the Great Recession, the 2015 migrant crisis, and an increase in income inequality. Although attitudes toward income redistribution were relatively stable, trends presented by countries grouped by welfare regime display considerable variation both among countries and among welfare regimes. We also trace trends in public support for redistribution by income groups and gauge the strength of belief in meritocracy and egalitarianism. The level of redistribution support among middle-income residents is similar to redistribution support of low-income residents, most notably in post-communist and social-democratic regimes. While egalitarianism is most widespread in the Mediterranean regime, meritocracy is most common in liberal and conservative regimes.