At the Roots of Allport’s “Prejudice-Prone Personality”: The Impact of Need for Cognitive Closure on Prejudice towards Different Outgroups and the Mediating Role of Binding Moral Foundations

In line with the seminal ideas on the “prejudice-prone personality” provided by Allport (1954) in the book The Nature of Prejudice, various studies have highlighted the association between individuals’ high need for cognitive closure (NCC) and prejudice towards various outgroups. Nonetheless, evidence on the invariance of individuals’ prejudice towards different outgroups is still missing. Study 1 and Study 2 aimed to provide evidence that individuals with high NCC display similar levels of prejudice towards different outgroups (i.e., people of a different race; people of a different religion; immigrants; people who speak a different language; people with a different sexual orientation), expressed in terms of desired social distance. Besides this, and based on the “group-centrism hypothesis” positing the role of groups as sources of epistemic certainty and stability of knowledge, Study 2 tackled the process underlying the relation between NCC and invariance of prejudice towards different outgroups by testing the mediational role of binding moral foundations. Evidence from both studies supported the hypothesis that individuals with high NCC display prejudice towards different outgroups to the same extent and that binding moral foundations mediate this relationship. Implications of these findings with reference to interventions aimed to hinder prejudice towards outgroups will be discussed.