A Spectrum of Stigma and Self-Esteem - Part 1
Understanding the Social Mind with Dr. Carol Jasper
One of the few remaining benefits of being on X (formerly Twitter) these days is coming across fellow academics who share my interest in the psychology of conspiracy theories. I had the pleasure in 2021 to come across a tweet thread explanation by social psychologist Dr. Carol Jasper and it has stayed with me. I decided to reach out to Dr. Jasper and she kindly agreed to this interview. Firstly, I’ve unrolled and lightly reformatted her thread to make it a bit more readable.
https://twitter.com/DrCarolJasper/status/1600439775655170048
Why do people with strongly held views (anti-vaccination, climate denial, invested conspiracy theory believers etc) dislike being labelled in line with those views? There are a number of potential reasons; a thread:
Holding views which are against the ‘norm’ can lead to those holding the views being stigmatised. This can have an impact upon self-esteem and we’re driven often to preserve positive self image/esteem as much as we can. So how do we do that if our group, or the identity we share online or IRL is stigmatised by others?
1. We discredit the source of the stigma. We minimise their knowledge, we cast aspersions in the intentions, perhaps dismiss them online as ‘bots’ or as paid by powerful corps. This allows us to dismiss anything they say without consideration and to disallow any negative impact of their words. But this assumes we identify with the stigmatised label of say: climate denialist or anti-vaxxer.
2. A second strategy is to psychologically distance yourself from the main body of the group. For example, I’m not anti-vax, I’m anti this vax (this of course could also be accurate) but often it’s a way to divert the stigma to another section of the group. So I’m not like ‘them’ they are worse. This allows an individual to remain within a group but not to have to absorb the stigma.
3. Assumed moral superiority. This is noticed in vegan communities where there can be an assumed ethical superiority both over non vegans but also over other vegans. Again, creating a psychological distance to divert stigma.
There can, however, also be a protective benefit to being in a stigmatised group. There can be a source of positive self-esteem from this group membership too which does explain some benefit to echo chambers. I’ve been asked a few times to explain why people react how they do when being identified with a stigmatised identity. One explanation is to think about is if their self-esteem might be threatened by stigmatised identities and if so, you should be able to identify these strategies in their responses. Which can help drive more positive debates.
Paul: Dr Jasper, firstly, thanks for agreeing to this. You and I come from different academic traditions so first I wanted to you the opportunity to share a bit about your background and how it might differ from mine.
Hi Paul, it is a pleasure to be asked to contribute. I am a bit of a late starter to academia having worked previously in a corporate position investigating fraud. When my eldest daughter arrived, I had some time to reflect and realised I was very much a ‘square peg in a round hole’. I retrained as a psychologist, fully intending, as many do, to be in clinical practice. Various incidents regarding a childhood illness of my daughter, which required frequent hospitalisation, subsequently altered my course. Once I discovered social psychology, however, I realised that was my best ‘fit’ and have never regretted that decision since. Understanding the principles of inter-group relations, conflicts and resolution allow those principles to be applied to limitless issues including those you refer to as ‘hot button’.
What got you interested in looking into how people feel about being labelled for their beliefs, especially with hot-button issues like anti-vax and climate change?
Over the pandemic I became increasingly aware of the anti-vax propaganda and the ease with which that was engaging public interest versus scientific evidence. I had been exposed to similar views at the time of my daughters’ MMR vaccinations so I had some indication of the quality of evidence and use of emotional triggers within that debate and, importantly, how vulnerable new parents can be to misinformation especially that which seems plausible to ‘protect’ your child.
Until the pandemic, however, I had not realised how many credentialed people were disseminating this type of disinformation. As I viewed these interactions, I realised that there were identities being offered to those who chose the anti-vaxxer (AV) perspective. Often they were hailed as mavericks, free thinkers, critical thinkers and so on. These are really attractive ‘labels’ particularly for those who might not have had the benefit of higher education. This aligns with the ‘social’ motive for believing a conspiracy theory (CT). At this point can I clarify that I am using CT to mean attributing the cause of various events to global, often evil, cabals who are controlling in secret, underground networks. Importantly, these views must exist in the presence of a more plausible explanation.
In short then, lots of people appeared to be motivated to claim these flattering aspects of the AV labels evidenced by their inclusion of these phrases in their Twitter (now X) biographies etc. Interestingly though, they were often less keen to accept the overarching, unifying label of ‘anti-vaxxer’ despite that being a literal translation of their expressed beliefs.
You mentioned that holding views that go against the ‘norm’ can make people feel stigmatized and impact their self-esteem. How might this play out in their daily life and affect their well-being?
This is a very interesting question. If I can reflect first on my own vegan lifestyle which is often pilloried and stigmatised?
Sure, go ahead.
We have a developing interest in which vegans ‘stay’ vegan as many people don’t. Initial ideas suggest that one factor which helps vegans stay vegan in the face of stigmatisation, is a historic rejection of social norms. What I mean by that is that many vegans are comfortable being ‘different’ and have perhaps engaged with various sub-cultures in terms of their choices throughout their life; alternative music, fashion, non-vegan activism, political beliefs etc. This appears protective for many long-term vegans rendering them often comfortable in their socially contested identities. Basically - they often don’t mind being seen as different or even as extreme.
Right - I can see how that works, needing to become comfortable with being ‘different’. The amount of social hostility that vegans and vegetarians attract is quite noticeable, especially the caricature of the judgemental vegetarian. It even made it into a Simpsons episode about Lisa although that has a good ending in that Lisa stays vegetarian.
I do like that episode and most people don’t realise that Meat Free Monday was a McCartney idea!
In contrast, though, we have observed that many who are labelled as CT, AV, etc tend to be more likely to be conservative in their views and their orientation to stigmatised identities comes often from a desire to preserve the status quo. This encourages a tendency to associate with ‘contrarian’ views. The pandemic required people to make changes such as masking, isolating, and vaccinating. This triggered a response in many people who resisted the requirement for community-based action prioritising their individual freedoms. This individualism is also more common within right wing belief systems; however, CT beliefs are represented in both right- and left-wing extremes. The same desire to resist change can be seen in rejection of anthropogenic climate change denial and 15-minute cities. These are all linked with individual level change. It is easy to reject those changes if you believe that they are being imposed by unelected others who have nefarious intent. People like Bill Gates and Klaus Schwab are frequently suggested as being responsible for these changes based mainly on their investments and interests.
So, these contrarian beliefs serve a function of legitimising a self-serving, individualised response to change which is necessary to avoid coercion or control by those imposing the changes. In this way, the label is acquired in an entirely different manner than that noted above of the ethical vegan who is more likely to resist a social norm for ideological reasons that are primarily rooted in change and not invested in maintaining the status quo.
If you have hitched your wagon to the contrarian lifestyle - often promoted by online influencers ranging from David Icke to Russell Brand - you may be subject to ridicule from friends and family. In some cases, this is justified, vaccines do not make you magnetic as certain doctors have falsely claimed. In other cases, though the person often does not have a reasoned position about vaccines for example. They may repeat tropes such as ‘it’s experimental’, ‘it’s poisonous’, ‘it causes turbo cancer’, ‘it causes VAIDS’, ‘PCR doesn’t work’ and so on. In conversation with work colleagues and in social settings – these beliefs are often dismissed as nonsense. Most people realise that whilst vaccines are not perfect, if they are a bioweapon – they are a very bad one as the global population continues to rise.
These tensions can cause fractures with friendships, relationships and place strain on marriages and families, especially when the evidence often amounts to ipsedixitisms - ‘it just is’ or social media content which most rational people don’t accept as medical or scientific evidence. All of this combined can lead to a reduction in self-esteem in real life and drive retreats online where these fringe beliefs can be rewarded. Then we see the development of echo chambers where dissenting/rational voices are dismissed as ‘shills’ and, believe it or not, members of the British Military 77th Brigade who are covert disruptors online! When challenged the AV/CT believer often blocks rather than discuss as they avoid threats to their world-view allowing algorithms to drive more and more contrarian content their way. Thus, strengthening their belief that they are the ‘wakened’ and those who ‘see’ clearly what ‘they’ are doing to us.
In part two of this interview, available here, we’ll get into the tweet replies Carol got and whether they fit with the predictions from the social psychology research.