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Different Minority Groups Elicit Different Safety, Economic, Power, and Symbolic Threats

  • Dóra Kanyicska Belán EMAIL logo and Miroslav Popper
Published/Copyright: December 23, 2022

Abstract

Populistic political discourse often portrays ethnic minorities as threats to the majority society. However, the deeper characteristics of perceived threats have not been sufficiently empirically investigated. The goal of this study is to identify the similarities and differences in intergroup threats perceived by Slovak majority from Roma, Muslims, and ethnic Hungarian minorities. The participants included 1244 adults who were instructed to write the first five associations that came to mind when thinking about one of the minorities. Our findings indicate that power threat was dominant from the Hungarian minority and safety threat from the Roma and Muslim minorities. Moreover, the safety threat from the Roma minority related mainly to theft and violence, while from Muslims it was terrorism. Mapping and addressing specific threats associated with different minorities can help explain misperceptions and reduce prejudice against them.


Corresponding author: Dóra Kanyicska Belán, Institute for Research in Social Communication, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, Slovakia, E-mail:

  1. Research funding: This research was supported by the project VEGA 2/0102/22.

  2. Conflict of interest statement: The authors declare no conflicts of interest regarding this article.

  3. Author contributions: All the authors have accepted responsibility for the entire content of this submitted manuscript and approved submission.

Appendix. Illustration of the coding–symbolic threat perceived by the Slovak majority from muslims

Second-order category First-order category Codes (quantity)
Symbolic threat Islamic faith Sharia (37) jihad (28) religion (15) Allah (2) Islam (9) Islamism (7) other religion/faith (9) Allah Akbar (5) burqa (7) veiling the face (6) Koran (3) mosque (3) hijab (2) orthodox religion (2) Arab headscarves (2) asserting their faith (2) religious dogmas (1) religious beliefs (1) pork ban (1)
Threat to culture Culture (8) threat to our culture (6) promotion of their culture (6) extinction of Slovak traditions (3) customs (2) construction of mosques (2) deculturalization (2) foreign culture (2) demolition of churches (1) dechristianization (1) discrimination of our religion (1) education of Islam (1) cultural incompatibility (1) culture shock (1) suppression of Christianity (1) mandatory sharia (1)
Religious extremism Religious extremism (43) fanaticism (12) radical Islamists (8) religious fundamentalism (3) religious fanaticism (6) extremists (4) religious coercion (3) Islamization of Europe (2) religious attacks (2) religious radicalism (1) religious oppression (1) imprisonment for the Christian faith (1) subversion of religions (1) imposition of their faith (1)

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Received: 2022-04-19
Revised: 2022-07-12
Accepted: 2022-07-13
Published Online: 2022-12-23
Published in Print: 2023-02-23

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