Resistance to Change: A Social Psychological Perspective
Abstract
Resistance to change has been a central topic in social psychology since the inception of the field. It has been addressed by theorists as diverse as Thorstein Veblen, William McDougall, Kurt Lewin, Leon Festinger, and William J. McGuire, among others. Decades of research show that people are resistant to changing beliefs that are logically or psychologically connected to systems of beliefs and values that are important to them (i.e., ideologies). In this article, I describe some of the studies that I and others have conducted on the role of political ideology and system justification motivation in fostering skepticism and resistance to scientific information about climate change.
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System-justifying mechanisms reflect that some individuals and groups are motivated to preserve the status quo and resist social change, while others are motivated to challenge or improve upon it.
“System-justifying mechanisms, which are often overlooked in social psychological analyses of political polarization, reflect the fact that some individuals and groups are motivated to preserve the status quo — and to resist various forms of social change — while others are motivated to challenge or improve upon it100,101.”
From Cognitive–motivational mechanisms of political polarization in social-communicative contexts (2022) · cites this paper as [100]
Additional cognitive-motivational mechanisms that may exacerbate issue polarization include selective avoidance of counter-attitudinal information and motivated resistance to attitude change.
“Additional cognitive–motivational mechanisms that may exacerbate issue polarization include other forms of reduction in cognitive dissonance, such as selective avoidance of counter-attitudinal information and motivated resistance to attitude change (see Table 1), both of which reflect ego-defensive motives to avoid inconsistency and maintain the individual’s pre-existing beliefs, opinions and”
From Cognitive–motivational mechanisms of political polarization in social-communicative contexts (2022) · cites this paper as [100]
Cites
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Cognitive–motivational mechanisms of political polarization in social-communicative contexts
Jost, J. T., Baldassarri, D. S., & Druckman, J. N. (2022) · Nature Reviews Psychology · doi:10.1038/s44159-022-00093-5 · Cited by 276 · see citing works
Self-citationMotivated recall in the service of the economic system: The case of anthropogenic climate change.
Hennes, E. P., Ruisch, B. C., Feygina, I., Monteiro, C. A., & Jost, J. T. (2016) · Journal of Experimental Psychology: General · doi:10.1037/xge0000148 · Cited by 116 · see citing works
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- Authors
- Jost, J. T.
- Corresponding author
- Jost, John T.
- ORCID
- Jost, John T.
- Venue
- Social Research: An International Quarterly
- Publisher
- Project MUSE
- Published
- 2015-09
- Volume
- 82
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 607-636
- ISSN
- 0037-783X (ISSN-L)
- 1944-768X
- OpenAlex
- W2264956758
- Cited by
- 112
- References
- 6
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 22 · 2024: 10 · 2023: 12 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 12 · 2020: 11 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 10 · 2017: 10 · 2016: 2
- FWCI
- 24.32
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Social research (publishedVersion)
- Project Muse (Johns Hopkins University) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Climate Change Communication and Perception
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Statistical and Nonlinear Physics › Opinion Dynamics and Social Influence
- Keywords
- resistance to change, political ideology, system justification, climate change skepticism, climate change denial, belief revision, values and beliefs
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