Transcending oneself through social identification

Castano, Emanuele Yzerbyt, Vincent [UCL] Paladino, Maria-Paola

This brief survey of life strategies suggests that a recurrent theme in human beings' struggle with the unbearable finitude of being is the reliance on a community, be it local or imagined. In this chapter we elaborate on this thesis from a social psychological perspective and argue that affiliation to and, more crucially, identification with social groups is ranked high in the repertoire of strategies that human beings use to transcend themselves. Specifically, we contend that through social identification, individuals expand their sense of self in space and time, thus participating in a larger, immaterial, and therefore immortal entity. The development of these ideas is grounded in social identity theory and terror management theory. We begin by outlining the main concepts of these theoretical perspectives before presenting some empirical evidence in support of our thesis.