Playing to the gallery: investigating the normative explanation of ingroup favoritism by testing the impact of imagined audience

The present research examined the role of social norms as a determining source of ingroup favoritism in minimal groups. Across three studies (total N = 814), results showed that ingroup favoritism was reduced when participants imagined the reaction of an external (and egalitarian) entity, as compared to a control condition or a condition in which they were explicitly asked to imagine the reaction of ingroup members. In line with the prediction that the desire to appear as a good group member drives conformity to the ingroup norm, the findings also revealed that favoring the ingroup resulted in higher self-esteem (Study 2). This was however limited to situations where the ingroup norm was inferred or induced to be pro-discriminatory, but not when it was anti-discriminatory (Study 3). The proposed explanation is discussed in the light of dominant explanations of ingroup favoritism.