The Norm-Activating Power of Celebrity: The Dynamics of Success and Influence

Social Psychology Quarterly retracts the article “The Norm-activating Power of Celebrity: The Dynamics of Success and Influence,” by Siegwart Lindenberg, Janneke F. Joly, and Diederik A. Stapel, which appeared in the March 2011 issue (74(1):98–120; DOI: 10.1177/0190272511398208). This retraction stems from the results of an investigation into the work of Diederik A. Stapel (https://www.commissielevelt.nl/noort-committee/publications-examined/), which finds strong evidence of fraud in the dataset supplied by Stapel. His coauthors had no knowledge of his actions and were not involved in the production of the fraudulent data.On the basis of previous evidence, we reasoned that even if people do not identify with celebrities, these celebrities can influence their behavior by activating bundles of social norms. Activating a norm means making both content and “oughtness” of the norm more directly relevant for behavior. We further reasoned that in order to have this norm-activating effect, celebrities have to hav...