Attitudes towards trans* people in view of the Awareness of one's own mortality

The awareness of one's own mortality, mortality salience, triggers fear in people (Greenberg et al., 1997). In order to deal with this fear, worldviews are used as cultural buffers against the fear as defense mechanisms (Pyszczynski et al., 1999), a process that has been widely studied in the context of terror management theory. It can be assumed that attitudes towards trans* people are also linked to cultural and gender-based worldviews. However, little is known about the connection between mortality salience and attitudes towards trans* people. The present research examines this connection with two sequential laboratory experiments. The focus of the first study was the Worldview Defense Hypothesis (N = 21), which could not be confirmed. A modified replication of the design with 34 participants also showed no significant results: Furthermore, the importance of participants' religiosity for their evaluation of trans* people was demonstrated. The more religious people are, the more hostile their evaluation of trans* people is. The participants' reasons for or against a trans* woman using the women's restroom provide clues for a speculative response to the hypotheses.