Stollberg Janine, Bogdan Danja, Jonas Eva
Department of Psychology, University of Salzburg, Hellbrunner Str. 36, 5020, Salzburg, Austria.
Sci Rep. 2024 Aug 1;14(1):17825. doi: 10.1038/s41598-024-68145-9.
Climate change can evoke intergenerational conflict. Structural inequalities and their unequal impact on generations can increase perceptions of collective victimhood among the younger generation (< 30 years) and bear the risk of social tensions between the young and the elderly. An experimental study (N = 434) showed that younger people perceived an increased risk of future victimhood. In line with a needs-based approach, the young reported an increased desire to pursue agentic intergroup goals, indicating a heightened need for agency. However, when the young received empowering messages that affirmed their ingroup agency, their willingness to reconcile with the old generation increased, whereas informing them about non-agentic ingroup behavior did not affect reconciliation (between-subjects manipulation). While empowering messages from the outgroup ("Grannies for Future") that directly affirmed the young generations' agency for climate change mitigation as well as empowering messages from the ingroup that indirectly affirmed ingroup agency in domains unrelated to climate change both addressed the need for agency, only outgroup empowerment promoted intergenerational reconciliation. However, empowerment did not affect support for collective climate action. We discuss empowerment as an avenue for resolving intergroup conflict in the context of climate change and possible consequences for climate action and social change.
气候变化可能引发代际冲突。结构性不平等及其对不同代际的不平等影响，可能会增强年轻一代（<30岁）的集体受害者意识，并存在年轻人与老年人之间社会紧张关系的风险。一项实验研究（N = 434）表明，年轻人认为未来成为受害者的风险增加。根据基于需求的方法，年轻人报告称追求积极的群体间目标的愿望增强，这表明对行动力的需求增加。然而，当年轻人收到肯定其群体行动力的赋能信息时，他们与老一代和解的意愿增加，而告知他们群体的非积极行为并不会影响和解（组间操纵）。虽然来自外群体（“未来老奶奶”）的直接肯定年轻一代缓解气候变化行动力的赋能信息，以及来自内群体的间接肯定与气候变化无关领域内群体行动力的赋能信息都满足了对行动力的需求，但只有外群体赋能促进了代际和解。然而，赋能并未影响对集体气候行动的支持。我们讨论了赋能作为在气候变化背景下解决群体间冲突的途径以及对气候行动和社会变革可能产生的影响。
