Procedure, manipulations and materials

The rationale for having participants first complete a questionnaire assessing their identification with the University of Geneva was to be able to identify in the initial pool those with a priori stronger and weaker identification with the University. The underlying idea was to be able to create two groups of participants based on their identification with the University and then, to match them to correspondingly high and low social identity salience experimental conditions when they would come back to complete the second questionnaire relating to appraisals and emotions. Specifically, the group of participants with stronger identification was assigned to the high social identity salience condition (i.e., designed to enhance the intergroup dimension of the

3 The male/female proportions are representative of psychology students at the university of Geneva.

experiment), and those with weaker identification were assigned to the low social identity salience condition (i.e., designed to enhance the interpersonal dimension of the experiment). In this way, it was expected that the salience of the University of Geneva social identity would be the strongest for participants in the high social identity salience condition and the lowest for participants in the low social identity salience condition.

a) Questionnaire 1: Assessing identification with the University of Geneva.

Participants were welcomed as a group by the experimenter. They were reminded that this study was part of a larger project concerning students’ reactions to changes in their University. Participants were then requested to complete this questionnaire individually and in silence, and were encouraged to answer all questions as honestly as possible. In the first page of the questionnaire they were informed that they were about to complete a questionnaire that would ask them some general questions about themselves (such as their age, sex, etc) and about their general attitudes toward their University. They were told that this information would help the researchers better describe the group of participants as whole. Finally, they were told this questionnaire was not an official university enquiry, nor was it part of an external audit.

This questionnaire actually measured participants’ collective self-esteem with regard to the “University of Geneva social identity” using an adaptation of Luhtanen &

Crocker’s (1992) collective esteem questionnaire. The original collective self-esteem scale CSS consists of 16 items divided into four subscales: private collective self-esteem PrCS (e.g., In general, I’m glad to be a member of this group);

membership self-esteem MS (e.g., I feel a worthy member of this group); public collective self-esteem PuCS (e.g., In general, others respect this group); and

importance to identity IS (e.g., In general, this group is an important part of my self-image). For the purposes of this study, the original 16 English items were translated to French and back-translated by an independent translator to check for accuracy. All items were then adapted to make reference to the “University of Geneva student membership” (questionnaire reproduced in Appendix A.2.). To reduce the transparency of the scale it was decided to add 8 filler items, which asked some general questions about student life (e.g., I find that studying in Geneva is very pleasant). Participants responded to items using a 9-point response scale (from 1=

“strongly disagree” to 9 “strongly agree”). Luhtanen & Crocker (1992) report subscale alphas in the .70’s and .80’s, and acceptable test-retest reliability (r = .68) over a 6-week interval. In this study, the translated collective self esteem scale and each of it subscales showed high internal consistency (alphas for CSE=.83, PrCS=.78, MS=.63, PuCS=.79, and IS=.84). Crocker & Luhtanen (1990) have argued that the private collective self-esteem subscale (e.g., “I feel good about the social groups I belong to”) is the subscale that comes closest to how Tajfel defined social identity (Tajfel, 1982). Thus, it was decided to create two groups of participants based on the median split of the scores for this sub-scale (Median=7.75). When completing the second questionnaire, the group of participants with private collective self esteem scores higher than the median (N=55⁴) were matched to the high social identity salience condition. Accordingly, the group of participants with scores lower than the median (N=58⁵) were matched to the low social identity salience condition.

b) Questionnaire 2: Assessing appraisal and emotion responses to the vignettes describing events associated to the merger. Two weeks after completing the first questionnaire, participants came back to complete the second questionnaire

(reproduced in Appendix A.3.). Again, participants were welcomed as a group by the experimenter and they were reminded that this study was part of a larger project concerning students’ reactions to changes in their University. Participants were told that in this questionnaire they would be presented with 6 written vignettes describing several events that concerned their University. They were told that it was important that for each vignette they responded, immediately and as honestly as possible, to questions regarding their perceptions about the event and the emotions evoked by the event in terms of type and intensity. Participants were then requested to complete this questionnaire individually and in silence. The cover sheet included a sample of the official statement made by the deans of both universities stating their position on the proposed merger. There were two versions of the second page of the questionnaire, one per social identity salience condition. The versions differed in terms of the content of the written instructions as shown in Table 2.1.

4 This group included 8 males and 34 females, 38 Swiss and 4 non-Swiss, with a mean age of 23.19 years, and who had resided in Geneva for an average of 12.07 years.

Table 2.1. Summary of instructions in the two social identity salience conditions High Social Identity Salience Low Social Identity Salience

To enhance the intergroup dimension of the study

-The aim of this study is to compare how students at the University of Geneva (UniGE) and students at the University of Lausanne (UniL) react to events associated to the proposed merger between the university of Geneva and the university of Lausanne.

-In this study we are interested in comparing differences between University of Geneva and the University of Lausanne students.

-You are about to read a series of events and for each event you will have to answer to some questions concerning you emotional reactions.

-Results will be included in an important publication titled “Differences between UniGE-UniL in perceptions of events associated to themerger between UniGE and UniL”.

-To make sure that this publication relies on valid information, it is extremely important that you remain honest in your answers.

To enhance the interpersonal dimension of the study -The aim of this study is to compare how different people react to events associated to the proposed merger between the university of Geneva and the university of Lausanne.

-In this study we are interested in interpersonal differences between students.

-You are about to read a series of events and for each event you will have to answer to some questions concerning you emotional reactions.

-Results will be included in an important publication titled “Interpersonal differences in perceptions of events associated to themerger between UniGE and UniL”.

-idem

The remaining of the questionnaire was identical for both social identity salience conditions. Participants were presented with the 6 written vignettes (i.e., presented in random order) and for each vignette they responded to questions concerning their appraisals and emotions about the event described. One vignette was presented per page, and each time the vignette was positioned at the top of the page and appraisal and emotions questions were positioned immediately below the vignette. The content of the written vignettes was based on three sources: official documentation published by both Universities to inform students about the proposed merger and it’s

consequences; the journals of the respective student unions; and print and television media. Concretely, the vignettes described specific events associated to the merger that were selected based of their potential for inducing anger in this student

population. The vignettes included the following:

5 This group included 8 males and 31 females, 32 Swiss and 7 non-Swiss, with a mean age of 22.05 years, and who had resided in Geneva for an average of 7.72 years.

1) Vignette 1: The merger between the canton⁶ of Geneva and the Canton of Vaud in general.

2) Vignette 2: The merger between the University of Geneva and the University of Lausanne in general.

3) Vignette 3: Courses for first year students will remain distinct and specific to each University campus.

4) Vignette 4: Courses for students in second and third year will be shared between the two Universities, this will imply the moving of professors and/or students.

5) Vignette 5: Postgraduate students will have to move as a function of the place where the courses get taught.

6) Vignette 6: Courses with few students attending (low number of inscriptions) or highly specialized will be cancelled.

c) Appraisals. Participants had to rate each vignette according to 12 appraisal items using a 9-point response scale (from 1= “not at all” to 9= “very much”). These items were intended to measure four major appraisal dimensions,

1) Pleasantness: extent to which the event was considered to be pleasant, and extent to which the event was considered to be unpleasant.

2) Goal significance: extent to which the event was considered to be important, extent to which the event helped them obtain something that they wanted, extent to which the event got in the way of them getting something that they wanted.

3) Coping potential: extent to which the event was due to chance, extent to which the event was caused by someone else, caused by someone else intentionally, had consequences that the person could control or modify, and had consequences that the person could adapt to.

4) Compatibility with norms: extent to which the event was considered to be morally acceptable by most people, and was considered as unjust or unfair by most people.

d) Emotion response type and intensity. Participants were then asked to characterize the emotion they felt immediately after reading the vignette by rating the intensity for 12 emotions, 6 negative (anxiety, irritation, frustration, anger, shame,

6 Although this event does not seem to be explicitly linked to the University of Geneva social identity, it was judged to be pertinent given the socio-political context in which this social identity was embedded at the time of the study.

contempt), 5 positive (interest, relief, happiness, joy, pride) and surprise. All ratings were done on a rating scale from 1= “very weak” to 9= “very strong” with the

possibility of using 0= “not at all”. The 12 emotions were presented in random order, and an empty space was left at the end of the questionnaire to offer the possibility of indicating other emotions not included in the list.

e) Questions concerning their demographic background. On the final page of the questionnaire participants indicated their age, sex, number of years living in Geneva, nationality, canton of origin, mother tongue, and faculty.

f) Manipulation check questions. On the final page, participants responded to a question about the importance they attributed to their studies, a question about

whether they identified with the University of Geneva, and one question asking them about whether they thought that the events presented in the vignettes could be

characterized as inducing emotion. Again all items we rated on a scale from 1= “not at all” to 9= “very much”.

Furthermore, to check for the potential influence of other social identities that may have become salient to participants during the study it was decided to measure the importance (from 1= “not at all” to 9= “very much”) and valence (1= “negative” to 9=

“positive”) attributed, at the moment of the study, to a series of other group

memberships presented in random order including: sex, age, profession, country of birth, canton of residence, canton of origin, University, faculty, and section or department. An empty space was left at the end of the questionnaire to offer the possibility of indicating other group memberships not appearing in the list. Upon completion of the questionnaire participants were thanked for their participation.