People adopt anti-establishment attitudes when they feel threatened, study suggests

A series of four studies confirmed the link between feeling threatened and anti-establishment attitudes. The type of threat in question was not important, as both realistic and symbolic threats predicted anti-establishment attitudes. The research was published in Cognition and Emotion.

Many people feel threatened by ongoing developments in their societies. They may feel threatened by current political ideologies, economic developments, military conflicts their society is engaged in, or by more complex developments (e.g., economic changes driven by climate change). As a result, they may develop negative sentiments toward the current situation in their society, i.e., develop anti-establishment attitudes.

Anti-establishment attitudes are beliefs and sentiments that oppose or reject the existing political, social, or economic systems and the authorities that uphold them. Individuals with anti-establishment views may advocate for significant reforms, radical changes, or even the complete overthrow of current systems. Such attitudes can manifest in various forms, from peaceful protests to more extreme actions like rebellion or revolution.

Study author David Abadi and his colleagues focused on two types of anti-establishment attitudes—conspiracy beliefs and populist attitudes. Conspiracy beliefs are convictions that powerful, secretive groups or individuals are manipulating events and information for their own benefit, typically at the expense of the general public. Populist attitudes emphasize the idea of “the people” versus “the elite,” advocating for the rights and power of ordinary citizens against perceived corrupt or out-of-touch elites. The authors note that anti-establishment attitudes are rooted in people’s anxiety.

They sought to determine which types of threats are most important in predicting these anti-establishment attitudes. Are these realistic threats (e.g., threats to personal economic status, financial resources, or well-being), symbolic threats (e.g., threats to one’s system of values, cultural identity, or way of life), or both? They conducted a series of four studies to find out.

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The first study focused on two realistic threats stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic: the fear of contracting the COVID-19 virus (health threat) and the fear of the pandemic’s implications for the economy and public safety (societal threats). They analyzed data from a large-scale study in the Netherlands. One set of data came from 9,033 people who responded in April 2020 to questions about how worried they felt about the two mentioned types of threats and who completed a conspiracy mentality assessment (the Conspiracy Mentality Questionnaire). Six months later, 5,745 of these individuals completed an assessment of populist attitudes.

Study 2 analyzed data from a large-scale online panel conducted in 13 EU countries, involving over 70,000 participants. This study yielded similar data but distinguished between symbolic and realistic threats (fear of losing national culture and identity vs. fear of losing one’s job). In addition to assessments similar to Study 1, this study also included an assessment of political ideology. Study 3 included 8,059 participants and was similar to Study 2 in design and the multinational structure of participants. Study 4 increased the number of threats to four, with responses coming from participants in Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, and the U.K.

Study 1 showed that societal threats (threats to the economy and society from COVID-19) predicted both populist attitudes and conspiracy mentality, but the health threat used in the study did not. In other words, those perceiving a higher threat to the economy and society from COVID-19 tended to report stronger anti-establishment attitudes. However, the fear of personally contracting COVID-19 was not associated with either of the two anti-establishment attitudes.

In contrast, the results of Study 2 showed that both the symbolic and realistic threats used predicted both populist attitudes and conspiracy mentality. Additionally, women, less-educated individuals, and those with left-wing views tended to have stronger anti-establishment attitudes of both types. Study 3 confirmed the main findings: both symbolic and realistic threats predicted anti-establishment attitudes. However, in this study, education and gender were not associated with anti-establishment attitudes, but such attitudes tended to be somewhat stronger in older participants.

Finally, Study 4 differentiated between four types of threats: health threats (effects of coronavirus), climate threats (e.g., “How likely do you think it is that there will be food scarcity in your country?”), economic threats, and symbolic threats (threats to traditions due to immigration). Results showed that individuals feeling greater anxiety due to the effects of COVID-19 (health threat) and feeling a threat to their economic status tended to have stronger populist attitudes. On the other hand, individuals reporting higher levels of anxiety due to climate threats and economic threats, but not health threats, tended to have higher levels of conspiracy mentality.

“In conclusion, the current data show that both realistic and symbolic threats predict anti-establishment attitudes and therefore support the idea that generalized feelings of anxiety predict anti-establishment sentiments, relatively independent of what exactly has caused these feelings,” the study authors concluded.

The study sheds light on the association between feelings of threat and anti-establishment sentiments. However, it should be noted that all four studies were based solely on self-reports, leaving room for reporting bias to affect the results. Additionally, the design of these studies does not allow cause-and-effect inferences to be derived from the results.

The study, “Anti-establishment sentiments: realistic and symbolic threat appraisals predict populist attitudes and conspiracy mentality,” was authored by David Abadi, Jan Willem van Prooijen, André Krouwel, and Agneta H. Fischer.