Social Identity Complexity: Its Correlates and Antecedents

Social identity complexity (Roccas & Brewer, 2002) refers to individual differences in perception of one's multiple ingroup memberships. More specifically, social identity complexity is represented as perceived overlap in membership across pairs of ingroups, with lower overlap reflecting higher complexity. Previous research has demonstrated that social identity complexity is associated with tolerance and positive affect toward racial outgroups, and the present research explores further the nature of social identity complexity and its antecedents and correlates. Three studies are reported which examined the determinants of social identity complexity in different ways. Study 1 identified individual difference correlates of social identity complexity and demonstrated that perceived overlap predicts both explicit and implicit racial attitudes, above and beyond any effects of ideology and cognitive style. Study 2 confirmed the causal influence of the need for cognition on social identity complexity by demonstrating that manipulating need for cognitive elaboration influenced subsequent perceived overlap scores. Finally, Study 3 took advantage of a large field study with a diverse sample to assess the relationship between experience with an ethnically complex environment and social identity complexity.