Colloquium with Dr. Mark Brandt, Michigan State University

Annually the Department of Psychology hosts a Colloquia Series throughout the academic year. This exciting program brings us together outside of the classroom to have conversations with the speakers we’ve invited to our campus to share their ideas. You’ll have the chance to hear from international speakers on a wide range of provocative topics. Join us for our third annual colloquium lecture series featuring Dr. Mark Brandt from Michigan State University.

TITLE OF RESEARCH
COVID-19 as a real-world test of psychological theories of threat and politics.

ABSTRACT
We used the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic to evaluate the external validity of psychological theories of threat and politics. We estimate the causal effect of the onset of the pandemic on 84 political attitudes and 8 perceived threats using fine-grained repeated cross-sectional data (Study 1, N=232,684) and panel data (Study 2, N=552) collected before, during, and after the onset of the pandemic in the United States. The pandemic’s onset significantly changed attitudes, but these changes were often small and rarely consistent with theoretical predictions. Many attitudes were unaffected; however, these average effects max heterogenous treatment effects across people. Pandemic caused changes in threat perceptions were correlated with some attitude change, suggesting that some attitude change with people’s perceptions of threat. COVID-19’s onset caused some attitude change, but that the precise way it changed attitudes is heterogenous and not clearly predicted by psychological theories of threat.

RSVP
This colloquium is hybrid and will take place in-person and online through Zoom. Registration is required. RSVP to receive the Zoom link or event location (link to: https://psych.ubc.ca/rsvp-colloquium-mark-brandt/)