It's no secret that adolescents—and adults who have never emotionally matured beyond an adolescent stage—feel a strong need to conform. In most cases, this isn't particularly problematic. But what happens when one of their peers decides to act with pointless cruelty? Do others follow?
Disturbing new research from Eastern Europe suggest they often do—and this tendency is greatly amplified when the victim is a member of a maligned minority group.
"Our results suggest that fragile social norms can lead to a sudden change in individual behavior toward other ethnic groups—from good coexistence to aggression," said Jana Cahlikova of the Max Planck Institute in Munich. She is a co-author of the study, which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
[For more on this story by TOM JACOBS, go to https://psmag.com/social-justi...ty-can-be-contagious]
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