When we enjoy bad news about other groups: A social identity approach to out-group schadenfreude

When we enjoy bad news about other groups: A social identity approach to out-group schadenfreude

Two studies investigate schadenfreude (pleasure at the misfortune of others) as an emotional response to news about out-group misfortunes in a political and consumer context by analyzing reactions of voters for opposition parties to the downfall of a Dutch coalition government (Study 1), and of Blac...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Group processes & intergroup relations Vol. 21; no. 1; pp. 214 - 232
Main Authors: Ouwerkerk, Jaap W., van Dijk, Wilco W., Vonkeman, Charlotte C., Spears, Russell
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: London, England SAGE Publications 01-01-2018
Sage Publications Ltd
Subjects:
Coalition governments
Emotional responses
Group identity
Handheld computers
Mouth
News
Pleasure
Political opposition
Social groups
Social identity
Voters
Netherlands
intergroup emotion
negative word-of-mouth
social identity
schadenfreude
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Summary:Two studies investigate schadenfreude (pleasure at the misfortune of others) as an emotional response to news about out-group misfortunes in a political and consumer context by analyzing reactions of voters for opposition parties to the downfall of a Dutch coalition government (Study 1), and of BlackBerry users to negative news reports about Apple’s iPhone (Study 2). Consistent with social identity theory and intergroup emotion theory, both studies demonstrate that affective in-group identification increases schadenfreude reactions to news about an out-group’s misfortune, provided that this misfortune occurs in a domain of interest to news recipients. Additional findings show that this interaction effect attenuates when a misfortune instead befalls the in-group (Study 1) and is still observed when controlling for affective dispositions towards the out-group (Study 2). Moreover, results suggest that schadenfreude reactions strengthen subsequent intentions to share news about the out-group’s misfortune with others or to engage in negative word-of-mouth (Study 2).
ISSN:1368-4302
1461-7188
DOI:10.1177/1368430216663018