Kornel Świątnicki
Akademia Leona Koźmińskiego
Krzysztof Przybyszewski
Akademia Leona Koźmińskiego
Abstract:
The article presents results of two studies supporting the claim that the need to clean and avoid contamination of own group (associated with communal sharing or communion schema [see Fiske, 1992; Rai & Fiske, 2011]) is the true motive underlying vetting (referred to as lustration in Poland) because only belonging to a clean community can protect us from existential anxiety. In the first experiment mortality salience enhanced support for the idea of decommunization and lustration whereas the self-affirmation manipulation, consisting in writing about ones own values, failed to reduce it (result inconsistent with the prediction derived from popular terror management theory). In the second experiment mortality salience enhanced the support for vetting whereas physical cleansing (i.e. washing hands) reduced the support among low-anxiety participants.
Keywords:physical and moral cleansing, terror management, communion, vetting
Cite this article as:
Świątnicki, K., Przybyszewski, K. (2014). The effects of mortality salience and physical cleansing on support for vetting (or lustration). Psychologia Społeczna, 30, 298-310. doi: 10.7366/1896180020143003