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Beliefs about Negative Intentions of the World: A Study of the Israeli Siege Mentality

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Abstract

The present study introduces the concept of Siege Mentality which denotes a mental state in which group members hold a central belief that the rest of the world has negative behavioral intentions toward them. Two scales were constructed to assess the level of Siege Mentality among a group of Israeli students: The General Siege Mentality Scale (GSMS) and the Israeli Siege Mentality Scale (ISMS). A series of analyses showed that Siege Mentality is a unique construct different from paranoid tendency and ethnocentrism, and that the two scales (GSMS and ISMS) assess a similar construct. Finally, the results show that Siege Mentality is the best predicted by the hawkish orientation regarding the Israeli-Arab conflict.
... It is a created and escalated enduring attitude towards political rivals and enemies. Hostility is often constructed or associated with strong negative emotions (Bar-Tal, 1986, Bar-Tal, Antebi, 1992aBar-Tal, Antebi, 1992b). ...
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... The association between collective narcissism and conspiracy theories is independent of the associations between individual narcissism and paranoia. It is the association between individual, not Typically assessed as mediators predicting prejudice and discrimination of the targeted outgroups or the rejection of the foreign aid to the ingroup from the targeted outgroup Bertin et al., 2022 Immigrant conspiracy beliefs: nine items from previous studies in the French context, e.g., "Immigrants are often involved in secret plots and schemes intended to disrupt French society" Cichocka et al., 2016b Beliefs in anti-Polish conspiracy, four items, e.g., "Western countries conspire against Polish people and intentionally falsify the history" Cichocka et al., 2016b Belief in Russian conspiracy, three items, e.g., "The [Smolensk] catastrophe was most likely a result of Russia's secret actions" Golec de Zavala & Cichocka, 2012 Siege beliefs: 12-item General Siege Mentality Scale, translated (e.g., Bar-Tal & Antebi, 1992), items reflecting the belief that the in-group is constantly threatened; e.g., "Most nations will conspire against us, if only they have the possibility to do so" Golec de Zavala & Cichocka, 2012 Belief in Jewish conspiracy: six-item Jewish Conspiracy Stereotype Scale by Kofta and Sędek (2005), e.g., "Members of this group reach their goals through secret agreements" Kofta et al., 2020 Belief in Jewish conspiracy: six-item scale ( Bilewicz et al., 2013), e.g., "Jews achieve their collective goals by secret agreements" Kofta et al., 2020 Endorsement of conspiracy stereotype of Jews (group is assigned conspiratorial intentions), six items Kofta et al., 2020 Endorsement of conspiracy stereotype of Germans (group is assigned conspiratorial intentions), six items Kofta et al., 2020 Endorsement of conspiracy stereotype of Russians (group is assigned conspiratorial intentions), six items Specific conspiratorial beliefs: four items, e.g., "The 2004 tsunami in Aceh was not caused by natural factors, but as a result of an Underwater Nuclear Bomb made by the United States and Israel" ...
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