Descriptive and injunctive emotion norms and identification influence group-based emotions

We investigated the simultaneous influence of descriptive and injunctive ingroup emotion norms and ingroup identification on group-based emotions triggered by ingroup-relevant events (Experiment 1) and by outgroup targets (Experiment 2). For both studies, we hypothesized that both perceived descriptive and injunctive emotion norms would influence experienced emotions (self-categorization effects), effects that would be moderated by identification (with high identifiers being more influenced by norms than low identifiers). We also expected identification to increase the relative positivity of ingroup-relevant emotions in Experiment 1. In each study, we activated ingroup membership, assessed ingroup identification, and then measured group-based emotions and participants’ perceptions of the ingroup’s descriptive and injunctive emotion norms. Both experiments produced strong evidence for independent effects of both descriptive and injunctive emotion norms on experienced emotion. However, evidence for the moderation of those effects by identification was inconsistent and qualified. Identification increased the relative positivity of ingroup-relevant emotions in Experiment 1 as predicted. We conclude that the role of self-categorization processes in constructing the subjective sense of group membership receives strong support in the group-based emotion domain, and discuss the implications of our results for understanding the role of identification in these studies.