Collective Trauma From the Lab to the Real World: The Effects of the Holocaust on Contemporary Israeli Political Cognitions

Abstract

This research tested whether chronic or contextually activated Holocaust exposure is associated with more extreme political attitudes among Israeli Jews. Study 1 (N 5 57), and Study 2 (N 5 61) found that Holocaust primes increased support for aggressive policies against a current adversary and decreased support for political compromise via an amplified sense of identification with Zionist ideology. These effects, however, were obtained only under an exclusive but not an inclusive framing of the Holocaust. Study 3 (N 5 152) replicated these findings in a field study conducted around Holocaust Remembrance Day and showed that the link between Holocaust exposure, ideological identification, and militancy also occurs in real-life settings. Study 4 (N 5 867) demonstrated in a nationally representative survey that Holocaust survivors and their descendants exhibited amplified existential threat responses to contemporary political violence, which were associated with militancy and opposition to peaceful compromises. Together, these studies illustrate the Holocaustization of Israeli political cognitions 70 years later. 3 0162-895X

How Is Existential Threat Related to Intergroup Conflict? Introducing the Multidimensional Existential Threat (MET) Model

“…The findings on past victimization are in keeping with previous research on exclusive framings of victimization (Vollhardt, 2012, 2015), and on the impact of the Holocaust on contemporary Jews, which shows that primes of the Holocaust increase hawkish political attitudes among Canadian Jews (Wohl and Branscombe, 2008), and that the Holocaust has become a central tenant of Israeli identity that influences the way Israelis perceive the conflict with the Palestinians (e.g., Klar et al, 2013; Canetti et al, in press; Hirschberger et al, in press). …”

“…Because previous research has indicated that both PD and PV are associated with greater hostility toward out-groups (Hirschberger et al, 2009; Halperin and Bar-Tal, 2011), we predicted that these two MET factors would also mediate the association between in-group identification and hawkish political attitudes. It should be noted that research often shows that existential threat is the driving force of nationalism and not the underlying mechanism explaining the link between nationalism and militancy (e.g., Castano, 2004; Canetti et al, in press). In the current research, however, we suggest that because in-group identification is a relatively stable construct, examining existential threat perceptions, which are more susceptible to change, as a process variable may open the possibility of fostering political change through changes in threat perception.…”

“…Research demonstrates that priming a group’s past victimization (PV) elicits in-group protective behaviors (Wohl and Branscombe, 2008), greater adherence with the group’s ideology and narrative (Canetti et al, in press), and more belligerence toward out-groups (Hirschberger et al, in press). This effect of victimization on conflict is not uniform, however, with exclusive victim beliefs usually associated with negative attitudes toward out-groups, and inclusive beliefs with more forgiveness and reconciliation motivations (Vollhardt, 2013, 2015; Vollhardt et al, 2016; but see Cohrs et al, 2015 for a more nuanced understanding of inclusive beliefs).…”

“…In the current research we examine the possibility that there may be important differences between future- and past- oriented collective concerns. Although both of these threats ultimately influence perceptions of the future, when the lens through which one looks is shaped by a memory of collective trauma it is more likely that this perception will be contaminated with a sense of perpetual victimhood (Klar et al, 2013; Canetti et al, in press). Conversely, an onward-looking perception of threats that is not burdened with collective memory may be more attuned to reality, and resistant to the biasing effects of narrative.…”

“…Clearly, once existential threats are understood as a multidimensional construct it will be possible to expand the current model and extend the investigation of threats in other directions. It is also necessary to stress that this model is currently applied to a Jewish-Israeli context wherein physical and symbolic collective threats are perceived as central to the conflict, and where the long-term victimization and statelessness of the Jewish people has a long-term impact that reverberates in the present (e.g., Klar et al, 2013; Canetti et al, in press). …”