Journal ArticleDOI
Terror management among Taiwanese: Worldview defence or resigning to fate?
Chih Long Yen,Chung Ping Cheng +1 more
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In this paper, the authors examined whether the TMT worldview defencebuffering effect found in Western cultures could be generalized to Asians in Taiwan and found that no such effect was found in the present studies.Abstract:
Terror management theory (TMT) proposes that people who are reminded of their mortality should be motivated to defend their cultural worldview. Studies 1 and 2 examined whether the TMT worldview defence‐buffering effect found in Western cultures could be generalized to Asians in Taiwan. No such effect was found in the present studies. This non‐significant result was robust when either a stronger distraction task was used (study 1) or when a subliminal manipulation of mortality salience was utilized (study 2). A meta‐analysis, including 24 TMT experiments in East Asia, was also conducted (study 3). The average effect size (d = 0.11, r = 0.055) of worldview defence among these experiments was not significantly different from zero. Study 4 found that mortality salience manipulation also did not change Taiwanese participants' view of reincarnation; however, it did make them more inclined to resign to fate, suggesting that they might be using this symbolic means to defend their anxiety of death. The issue of the generality of TMT to Asians was discussed.read more
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Book ChapterDOI
Thirty Years of Terror Management Theory: From Genesis to Revelation
Abstract: Terror management theory posits that human awareness of the inevitability of death exerts a profound influence on diverse aspects of human thought, emotion, motivation, and behavior. People manage the potential for anxiety that results from this awareness by maintaining: (1) faith in the absolute validity of their cultural worldviews and (2) self-esteem by living up to the standards of value that are part of their worldviews. In this chapter, we take stock of the past 30 years of research and conceptual development inspired by this theory. After a brief review of evidence supporting the theory's fundamental propositions, we discuss extensions of the theory to shed light on: (1) the psychological mechanisms through which thoughts of death affect subsequent thought and behavior; (2) how the anxiety-buffering systems develop over childhood and beyond; (3) how awareness of death influenced the evolution of mind, culture, morality, and religion; (4) how death concerns lead people to distance from their physical bodies and seek solace in concepts of mind and spirit; and (5) the role of death concerns in maladaptive and pathological behavior. We also consider various criticisms of the theory and alternative conceptualizations that have been proposed. We conclude with a discussion of what we view as the most pressing issues for further research and theory development that have been inspired by the theory's first 30 years.
Journal ArticleDOI
Toward a greater understanding of the emotional dynamics of the mortality salience manipulation: revisiting the "affect-free" claim of terror management research.
Alan J. Lambert,Fade R. Eadeh,Stephanie A. Peak,Laura D. Scherer,John Paul Schott,John M. Slochower +5 more
TL;DR: This work proposes that the MS manipulation can, in fact, produce significant and meaningful changes in affect once one employs the appropriate measures and experimental design, and reports 4 experiments, each of which demonstrates reliable activation of negative affect, especially with respect to fear-/terror-related sentiments.
Journal ArticleDOI
Cultural influences on terror management: Independent and interdependent self-esteem as anxiety buffers
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigated the role of relational versus personal self-esteem in moderating the effects of mortality saliency on worldview defense, and found that relational rather than personal selfesteem increased the defense of worldviews centered on collectivist-Chinese values following mortality salience.
Journal ArticleDOI
Enjoying life in the face of death: East-West differences in responses to mortality salience.
TL;DR: Five experiments explored the hypothesis that thinking about one's own death activates thoughts about enjoying one's life as moderated by culture and found that East Asians would be more likely than European Americans to think about life and strive more to enjoy life when mortality salience is evoked.
Journal ArticleDOI
Beyond terror: Towards a paradigm shift in the study of threat and culture
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors review the basic assumptions and findings of terror management theory and discuss some problems with those assumptions and found that the theory is not falsifiable, and that attempts to explain all of human behaviour in terms of a single core motive have been counterproductive.
References
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Book ChapterDOI
The Causes and Consequences of a Need for Self-Esteem: A Terror Management Theory
TL;DR: A review of the research supporting the existence of a need for self-esteem can be found in this article, where a theory that accounts for this need and specifies the role it plays in a variety of phenomena including self-presentation is presented.
Journal ArticleDOI
Meta-Analysis: Recent Developments in Quantitative Methods for Literature Reviews
Robert Rosenthal,M. R. DiMatteo +1 more
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Journal ArticleDOI
Evidence for terror management theory II: The effects of mortality salience on reactions to those who threaten or bolster the cultural worldview.
Jeff Greenberg,Tom Pyszczynski,Sheldon Solomon,Abram Rosenblatt,Mitchell Veeder,Shari Kirkland,Deborah Lyon +6 more
TL;DR: The authors found that mortality saliency led to positive reactions to someone who directly praised subjects' cultural worldviews and especially negative reactions to those who criticized them, but only among subjects high in authoritarianism.