Pressure to Protest: Need to Belong and Rejection Sensitivity Predict Youth Participation

Abstract: Younger people are over-represented in political protests, and tend to mobilise via social ties. As previous research has found participation to be predicted by the pressure to conform to social norms, i.e. by need to belong (NTB), and rejection sensitivity (RS), the current study aimed to investigate whether those relations would be stronger among younger people than older. Furthermore, the effect of NTB and RS were expected to vary across normative and non-normative protest activities, which were studied separately. Results from hierarchical multiple regressions on a representative sample of the Swedish population (N = 2,034), showed age-differences in the effects of NTB and RS on participation, with virtually opposite directions in normative and non-normative protests. Participation in normative protest activities was negatively predicted by RS, and positively by NTB. The latter was moderated by age and only true for younger people. Contrarily, RS positively predicted participation in non-normative protest activities, and more strongly so among younger people. Moreover, the positive effect of RS was stronger among those low in NTB. Results were discussed in terms of youth identity exploration, peer-pressure, and individualistic culture, as well as societal exclusion and recruitment to violent extremism.