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Abstract Ideological differences in nationalism and patriotism are well-known and frequently exploited, but the question of why conservatives exhibit stronger national attachment than liberals has been inadequately addressed. Drawing on theories of system justification and political ideology as motivated social cognition, we proposed that increased patriotism is one means of satisfying the system justification goal. Thus, we hypothesized that temporarily activating system justification motivation should raise national attachment among liberals to the level of conservatives. Three experiments conducted in New York, Arkansas, and Wisconsin support this hypothesis. In the first two experiments, liberals exhibited weaker national attachment than conservatives in the absence of system justification activation, consistent with prior research. However, exposure to system criticism (Experiment 1) and system-level injustice (Experiment 2) caused liberals to strengthen their national attachment, eliminating the ideological gap. Using a system dependence manipulation in Experiment 3, this pattern was conceptually replicated with respect to patriotic but not nationalistic attachment, as hypothesized. Thus, chronic and temporary variability in system justification motivation helps to explain when liberals and conservatives do (and do not) differ in terms of national attachment and why.

Introduction It is a truism of street politics and social science that national attachment is stronger on the political right than the left (e.g., Bealey, 1999, Karasawa, 2002 and Schatz et al., 1999). Accordingly, a recent Gallup Poll found that 48% of self-identified conservatives in the U.S. described themselves as “extremely patriotic,” in comparison with only 19% of liberals (Morales, 2010). Although these differences are well-known and frequently exploited for partisan gain (e.g., Fahey, 2007), the question of why conservatives exhibit greater patriotism than liberals has not been seriously addressed at the level of social, personality, or political psychology. Given that national attachment constitutes an important basis for societal organization ( Bar-Tal & Staub, 1997) and exerts profound effects on policy preferences ( Kosterman & Feshbach, 1989) and social and political attitudes ( Billig, 1995, Blank and Schmidt, 2003, Roccas et al., 2006 and Sidanius et al., 1997), the psychological origins and dynamics of ideological differences in national attachment should be of great theoretical and practical interest. In this article we draw on system justification theory (Jost & Banaji, 1994) and the theory of political conservatism as motivated social cognition (Jost, Glaser, Kruglanski, & Sulloway, 2003) to explain the ideological gap in national attachment. Specifically, we propose that conservatives possess an especially strong attachment to their nation insofar as it offers one means of attaining a chronic psychological goal to justify the existing social system and to defend it against criticism or attack (cf. Jost and Hunyady, 2005 and Liviatan and Jost, 2014). Furthermore, circumstances that temporarily activate the system justification goal should increase national attachment (especially patriotism) among liberals and others who are not typically as strongly attached to national symbols and institutions. Indeed, Gallup Polls conducted in the years after 9/11—an event that seems to have produced heightened levels of system justification motivation (e.g., see Jost et al., 2010, Nail and McGregor, 2009 and Ullrich and Cohrs, 2007)—found that 70% of Americans overall (and 57% of liberals) described themselves as “very” or “extremely patriotic” (Carroll, 2005). Although survey data such as these are suggestive of the possibility that conditions that increase system justification motivation would reduce or eliminate the ideological gap, an experimental approach is needed to isolate the causal effects of system justification motivation on national attachment for liberals and conservatives. Using convergent methods to activate system justification motivation, we conducted a series of experiments in New York, Arkansas, and Wisconsin to address just this possibility. These three states differ considerably in terms of their political and cultural contexts. According to the results of extensive Gallup polling, New York is one of the 10 most “liberal” states, Arkansas is one of the 10 most “conservative” states, and Wisconsin is between the two (see Jones, 2011). To the extent that similar effects are observed in these three contexts, the results may be considered to be fairly generalizable, at least in terms of the American frame of reference. Political conservatism as motivated social cognition Political conservatism is associated with system justification motivation, that is, the desire to defend, bolster, and justify existing social, economic, and political arrangements (Jost, Banaji, & Nosek, 2004). More specifically, conservatives score higher than liberals on various scales designed to measure system justification tendencies (including the rationalization of inequality), and they also exhibit implicit as well as explicit preferences for order, stability, tradition, and conformity over chaos, flexibility, progress, and rebelliousness (Jost, Nosek and Gosling, 2008, Matthews et al., 2009 and Napier and Jost, 2008). Presumably, these ideological differences in system justification are linked to individual differences in epistemic, existential, and relational needs to regulate uncertainty, threat, and social belongingness (e.g., see Hennes, Nam, Stern, & Jost, 2012). Indeed, Jost and colleagues (2003) conducted a meta-analytic review of 88 studies, which were carried out in 12 countries over a 44-year period, and found that left-right (or liberal-conservative) political orientation was linked to situational and dispositional variability in epistemic and existential needs to reduce and manage uncertainty and threat. For example, the adoption of a conservative (vs. liberal) orientation was associated with greater intolerance of uncertainty and ambiguity, less openness to new experiences, and stronger needs for order and structure (see also Carney et al., 2008 and Gerber et al., 2010). Conservatism was also associated with more intense perceptions of danger, threat, and death anxiety. These basic findings have since been replicated and extended in a variety of ways with respect to attitudinal, behavioral, and physiological (including neurocognitive) orientations toward uncertainty and threat (e.g., Amodio et al., 2007, Federico et al., in press, Jost et al., 2007, Kanai et al., 2011, Matthews et al., 2009, Nail et al., 2009, Oxley et al., 2008 and Shook and Fazio, 2009). Situational activation of system justification motivation While system justification tendencies differ between individuals, such as between liberals and conservatives, contextual variability in system justification motivation has also been observed. Several experiments have shown that criticisms of the social system (i.e., threats to its stability and legitimacy) lead people to display more conservative, system-justifying tendencies, such as the use of stereotypes to explain and justify inequality in society (Jost et al., 2005, Kay et al., 2005, Lau et al., 2008, Ledgerwood et al., 2011, Liviatan and Jost, 2014 and Wakslak et al., 2011). Similarly, threats to the perception that the social system is fair and just tend to stimulate compensatory efforts to justify or rationalize extant outcomes, consistent with just world theorizing (e.g., Feinberg and Willer, 2011, Hafer and Bègue, 2005, Lerner, 1980 and Nail et al., 2009). Finally, situational manipulations of system dependence (e.g., emphasizing the extent to which one's quality of life depends upon the nation or government) also activate system justification motivation and produce effects that are parallel to those elicited by criticisms of the system (e.g., Kay et al., 2009, Laurin et al., 2010 and van der Toorn et al., 2014; see also van der Toorn, Tyler, & Jost, 2011). In line with a person-by-situation interactionist framework of social behavior (e.g., Higgins, 1990 and Lewin, 1935), the temporary activation of system justification motivation should have a greater impact on the behavior of those whose levels of motivation are chronically low (vs. high). That is, situational triggers (such as exposure to system criticism, system-level injustice, and system dependence) are unlikely to make much of a difference in the behavior of individuals who are chronically high in system justification motivation. By contrast, the presence vs. absence of situational triggers should affect the behavior of individuals who are chronically low in system justification motivation. More specifically, situational triggers should elevate considerably the strength of system justification motivation for individuals who are chronically low, and under these circumstances they should behave similarly to individuals who are chronically high in justification motivation. It follows, then, that although there are rather strong individual differences between liberals and conservatives in terms of system justification tendencies, the situational activation of system justification motivation may reduce or even eliminate such ideological differences. Indeed, some evidence already suggests that system justification goals may be triggered momentarily and lead those who are chronically low on system justification motivation to exhibit the same system-justifying tendencies as those who are chronically high (Banfield et al., 2011, Cutright et al., 2011, Jost et al., 2005 and Ledgerwood et al., 2011). Most notably, Banfield et al. (2011) showed that exposure to system criticism caused low (but not high) system-justifiers to be more supportive of the organizational status quo and more likely to prefer domestic over foreign consumer products (see also Cutright et al., 2011). A parallel set of observations has emerged in research on authoritarianism. Specifically, Hetherington and Suhay (2011) found that perceived threat from terrorism is associated with greater support for restrictions on civil liberties and the “war on terror” for low but not high authoritarians (the latter of whom are already in favor of restrictive, aggressive policy stances). In addition, Nail and colleagues (2009) found that liberals' convictions concerning capital punishment, abortion, and regarding homosexuality were more “reactive” to (i.e., more affected by) mortality salience primes, in comparison with the convictions of conservatives, for whom death anxiety may be more chronically salient (Jost et al., 2003 and Jost et al., 2007). Our present line of thinking is comparable in nature. Given that political conservatism and confidence in the legitimacy of the status quo are positively correlated (e.g., Jost, Nosek, & Gosling, 2008), liberals should be more temporarily affected by activation of system justification concerns. National attachment as a means of attaining the system justification goal Consistent with an analysis of ideology as motivated social cognition, we hypothesize that strengthening one's attachment to the nation provides a means of attaining the goal of system justification (Carter, Ferguson, & Hassin, 2011), defined as the motivated defense of (in this case) national institutions, arrangements, and authority figures (see also Liviatan & Jost, 2014). National attachment is typically understood to represent love for and pride in one's country (Kosterman & Feshbach, 1989). It is associated with loyalty and commitment to the welfare of one's national group and a willingness to contribute to its success even at some personal cost. Insofar as it involves mobilizing mental (and perhaps material) resources in the service of protecting the nation against both symbolic and material threats, national attachment may represent a straightforward means of attaining the system justification goal. Consistent with this idea, numerous experiments have demonstrated that criticisms and other threats directed at the national system elicit defensive efforts to maintain the perception that the system is legitimate and good (Banfield et al., 2011, Kay et al., 2005, Liviatan and Jost, 2014, Ullrich and Cohrs, 2007 and Wakslak et al., 2011). National attachment might also help to satisfy the epistemic, existential, and relational needs that are theorized to underlie the system justification goal (Jost and Hunyady, 2005 and Jost, Ledgerwood and Hardin, 2008). For example, it has been suggested that identification with one's national group reduces uncertainty (Hogg, 2005 and Hogg, 2007), provides a sense of security (Greenberg, Solomon, & Pyszczynski, 1997), and helps people feel connected to others in their group (Brewer, 1991). Thus, strengthening one's national attachment might not only fulfill the proximal system justification goal, but also more distal epistemic, existential, and relational needs that underlie system justification strivings ( Hennes et al., 2012). The distinction between patriotism and nationalism It has been noted often that identification with or attachment to one's country can take various forms. The most common distinction made in political science is between two types of national attachment, namely nationalism and patriotism. While both imply a subjectively positive identification with the nation, customary usage is such that nationalism involves “a perception of national superiority and an orientation toward national dominance” ( Kosterman & Feshbach, 1989, p. 271), whereas patriotism—defined as love of country—does not (see also Blank and Schmidt, 2003, Roccas et al., 2008 and Schatz and Staub, 1997). Although nationalism and patriotism are positively correlated, they are differentially related to foreign policy positions ( Kosterman & Feshbach, 1989), attitudes toward minority groups ( Blank and Schmidt, 2003 and Sidanius et al., 1997), reactions to moral violations committed by ingroup members ( Roccas et al., 2006), and political ideologies ( Karasawa, 2002 and Schatz et al., 1999). Because we conceptualize the relationship between national attachment and system justification motivation (and its underlying epistemic, existential, and relational needs) as a means–goal association, the question of whether patriotism and/or nationalism serve as effective means of legitimizing the country (and what it stands for) may be answered only in connection with an individual's political ideology. Insofar as nationalism involves antipathy toward other countries, there is reason to assume that liberals will find it to be more objectionable than patriotism. Consistent with this idea, Schatz et al. (1999) reported that the baseline gap between liberals and conservatives was far greater for “blind patriotism” (an analog of nationalism) than “constructive patriotism.” Karasawa (2002) found that internationalism was a hallmark of liberal (but not conservative) ideology; this finding is highly consistent with the fact that liberals and leftists value universalism and benevolence more highly than conservatives and rightists ( Piurko, Schwartz, & Davidov, 2011). To the extent that nationalism is at odds with liberal ideology, we might expect that for liberals it would not serve as an acceptable means of fulfilling system justification motivation, even in response to system criticism, injustice threats, or system dependence. Thus, we would expect that temporary activation of system justification motivation would reduce liberal-conservative differences in patriotism but not nationalism. This hypothesis, which is unique to our theoretical perspective, was tested in our third and final experiment. Whereas social identity perspectives (e.g., Branscombe et al., 1999, Castano et al., 2002 and Hogg, 2007) would lead one to expect that exposure to group-based threats would increase the strength of virtually all forms of ingroup identification and ingroup favoritism (that is, both patriotism and nationalism), only our system justification perspective—as informed by the work of Banfield et al. (2011) and Cutright et al. (2011)—would generate the hypothesis that system threat and other situational triggers of system justification motivation would increase liberals' (but not conservatives') support for patriotism (but not nationalism). Overview of research Previous research in political science on so-called “rally effects” has focused on surges in presidential approval ratings during times of societal-level threat (e.g., Brody and Shapiro, 1989 and Mueller, 1970). To our knowledge, no previous study has investigated the hypothesis we address here, namely that temporary activation of system justification motivation would reduce or eliminate liberal-conservative differences with respect to patriotic attachment. Perhaps the closest precedent was conducted by Lambert and colleagues (2010), who found that participants rated a variety of patriotic symbols (e.g., the United States, statue of liberty, and American flag) as more favorable after watching video footage of the 9/11 terrorist attacks (compared to a control condition). The authors noted that this main effect was not moderated by participants' right-wing authoritarianism scores, but the sample “contained a large percentage of ‘superliberals’ who walked into the laboratory with intense dislike toward the sitting president at the time, George W. Bush” (p. 889). Thus, the findings of this experiment are consistent with the notion that system threat increases patriotic sentiment primarily among liberals. Similarly, Moskalenko, McCauley, and Rozin (2006) found that (predominantly liberal) college students scored higher on national identification soon after the terrorist attacks of 9/11 (vs. before), but they did not investigate the possibility that political orientation would moderate such effects. In the present research program, we examine potential interaction effects between liberalism-conservatism and strength of system justification motivation with the aim of shedding light on the psychological processes that help to explain when liberals and conservatives will (and will not) differ in terms of national attachment and why. In three experiments conducted in diverse political and cultural contexts, we investigated the hypothesis that liberals would exhibit weaker national attachment than conservatives in the absence of system justification activation, but that liberals would increase to the level of conservatives under experimental conditions that heighten system justification motivation (Hypothesis 1). In Experiments 1 and 2, we tested this prediction using convergent manipulations of system justification activation and divergent measures of national identification. In Experiment 3, we distinguished empirically between patriotism and nationalism to determine whether the activation of system justification motivation in liberals would increase patriotic but not nationalistic forms of attachment (Hypothesis 2).

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