Collaborative Research: Tests of Terror Management Hypotheses

恐怖管理理论试图解释 自尊和文化世界观的心理功能。 根据该理论，个体被保护免受焦虑 通过双组分文化焦虑缓冲器，包括（a） 文化世界观，包括一个人对现实的看法， 价值标准和不朽的希望，以及（B）自尊， 或者是一个人的价值标准 由文化世界观决定。从这个角度来看， 一个人对自己和自己所生活的世界的信念 起着保护某人不受 焦虑提供平静的概念是一致同意的 当其他人分享我们的信仰时， 其他人不同意我们的信仰。因为文化焦虑- 缓冲区需要持续的一致性验证， 保护免受焦虑，许多社会行为是针对 它的两个组成部分的验证。 研究表明：（a）提醒人们 死亡会增加他们对人的积极反应 和支持他们的世界观的想法， 他们对那些威胁他们的人和想法的反应 世界观，（B）高水平的自尊会降低焦虑 对威胁性刺激和防御性扭曲的反应， 大概功能，以减少一个人的焦虑，和（c）威胁， 文化世界观增加了对焦虑的敏感性， 对死亡的微妙提醒的反应。的目标 本研究分为三个部分：（1）研究 死亡与理论所假设的过程有关，（2）增加 通过进一步评估这两个理论的证据基础 死亡率显著性对行为的影响集中在 支持自尊和世界观以及自我的作用， 尊重和世界观在减轻死亡的关注，和（3） 评估情感反应和意识的作用 威胁性材料，以产生 理论这项研究将增加我们对为什么 自尊对个人来说是如此重要和有益。

Terror management theory attempts to explain the psychological functions of self-esteem and cultural worldviews. According to the theory, the individual is protected from anxiety by a dual component cultural anxiety buffer, consisting of (a) a cultural worldview, which includes one's conception of reality, standards of value, and hope of immortality, and (b) self-esteem, or the belief that one is living up to the standards of value prescribed by the cultural worldview. From this perspective, one's beliefs about oneself and the world in which one lives serve the essential defensive function of protecting one from anxiety. The equanimity-providing concepts are consensually validated when others share our beliefs and threatened when others disagree with our beliefs. Because the cultural anxiety- buffer requires continual consensual validation for effective protection from anxiety, much social behavior is directed toward the validation of its two components. Research has shown that: (a) reminding people of their mortality increases the positivity of their reactions to people and ideas that support their worldviews and the negativity of their reactions to people and ideas that threaten their worldviews, (b) high levels of self-esteem decrease both anxiety in response to threatening stimuli and defensive distortions that presumably function to reduce one's anxiety, and (c) threats to the cultural worldview increase susceptibility to anxiety in response to subtle reminders of one's mortality. The goals of this research are threefold: (1) to investigate the centrality of death concerns to the processes posited by the theory, (2) to add to the evidentiary base for the theory by further assessing both the effects of mortality salience on behavior focused on bolstering self-esteem and the worldview and the roles of self- esteem and the worldview in allaying death concerns, and (3) to assess the role of affective responses to and awareness of threatening material in the production of the effects posited by the theory. This research will increase our understanding of why self-esteem is so important and so beneficial for the individual.