Intergroup threat, social dominance, and the malleability of ideology: The importance of conceptual replication

The theory of malleable ideology of Knowles, Lowery, Chow and Hogan (2009) predicts that, under intergroup threat, anti-egalitarian individuals will exploit the malleable character of color-blindness and strategically claim to be strong supporters of it. In three studies conducted in France, we found no support for this theory when measuring color-blindness but strong support when using measures of laicite, an ideology of secularism. Indeed, those who score low on social dominance orientation (SDO) were more likely to support laicite than anti-egalitarian individuals. However, a situational threat (Study 1), a symbolic threat experimentally induced (Study 2), and a perceived symbolic threat (Study 3) were all related to increased support for laicite by people high in SDO, without affecting those low in SDO. Thus, laicite is a malleable ideology which can be adopted by individuals having contrasting motivations, as color-blindness in the USA. Implications for the role of exact and conceptual replications in the development of a psychological science are discussed.