School of Psychology - Directory - People - Dr Brock Bastian
School of Psychology
Room 459, McElwain Building (#24A)
University of Queensland
St Lucia QLD 4072
AUSTRALIA
PhD, University of Melbourne (2007)
My research focuses on two main areas of interest:
1) The psychology of morality: In this work I aim to understand how moral reasoning and moral intuition shape our social worlds and, in turn, are shaped by these worlds. I am interested in understanding the flexible nature of moral reasoning, the psychological contributors to this flexibility, and the extension and withdrawal of moral concern to both humans and non-humans alike. In this work I have demonstrated that moral concern can be subtly shifted by the perceived human qualities of others and that immoral behaviour can reduced the perceived humanity of both self and other and both perpetrator and victim. I have also examined moral concern in the domain of non-humans, demonstrating that our moral reasoning is largely shaped by our own needs and desires.
My work in this field has also focused on how core moral beliefs (about the nature of good and evil) accentuate concerns over ideological and belief based differences between people. This work aims to provide insights into the role of core moral beliefs in motivating intolerance of ideological diversity and righteous violence.
2) The psychology of adversity: In this work I focus on the role of adversity in producing a range of positive psychological outcomes. A key focus of this work is the experience of physical pain. Specifically, I aim to show that pain can produce a number of benefits at the intra-personal and inter-personal levels, such as enhancing pleasure, strengthening the self, and promoting social bonding. I have also investigated the interaction of physical pain and moral reasoning, for example, showing that pain can serve to reduce guilt.
One of the aims of this work is to provide a different perspective on adverse experiences, thereby moving beyond the idea that pain and adversity are always bad. My other work in this area explores the downside of valuing only positive and pleasurable experiences. In this work I have demonstrated that a valuation of happiness and devaluation of sadness has the ironic effect of increasing sadness. These findings have provided for an important reflection on how instances of Depression and Anxiety are understood and treated within societies, and how positive psychology (a focus on happiness) may have adverse effects for some.
**PDFs below are for personal use only. Publisher retains full copyright.
In Press
Bastian, B., Jetten, J., & Haslam, N. (in press). A relational perspective on dehumanization. In P. Bain, J. Vaes, & J-P Leyens (Eds.), Are we all human? Advances in understanding humanness and dehumanization.Psychology Press.
2013
Bastian, B., Denson, T.F., & Haslam, N. (2013). The Roles of Dehumanization and Moral Outrage in Retributive Justice. PLoS ONE 8(4): e61842. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0061842 Link
Bastian, B. (2013). Normative influences on secondary disturbance: The role of social expectancies. Australian Psychologist. PDF
Bastian, B., Jetten, J., Chen, H., Radke, H. R. M., Harding, J.F., & Fasoli, F. (2013). Losing our humanity: The self-dehumanizing consequences of social ostracism. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 39, 156-169. PDF
Bastian, B., Jetten, J., & Stewart, E. (2013). Physical pain and guilty pleasures. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 4, 215-219. PDF
2012
Haslam, N., Bain, P., Bastian, B., & Loughnan, S. (2012). A perspective on dehumanization. In M. Drogosz & M. Bilewicz (Eds.), Beyond stereotypes: Essentialism, entitativity, and dehumanization. Warsaw: PWN (196-208).
Swann, W. B., Jetten, J., Gomez, A., Whitehouse, H., Bastian, B. (2012). When group membership gets personal: A theory of identity fusion. Psychological Review,119, 441-456. PDF
Bastian, B., Costello, K., Loughnan, S., & Hodson, G. (2012). When closing the human-animal divide expands moral concern: The importance of framing. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 3, 421-429. PDF
Bastian, B., Lusher, D., & Ata, A. (2012). Contact, evaluation and social distance: Differentiating majority and minority effects. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 36, 100-107. PDF
Koval, P., Laham., S., Haslam, N., Bastian, B., & Whelan, J. (2012) Our flaws are more human than yours: Ingroup bias in humanizing negative characteristics. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 38, 283-295.PDF
Bastian, B., Jetten, J., & Radke, H. (2012). Cyber-Dehumanization: Violent video game play diminishes our humanity. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 48, 486-491. PDF
Bastian, B., Loughnan, S., Haslam, N., & Radke, H. (2012). Don’t mind meat? The denial of mind to animals used for human consumption. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 38, 247-256. PDF
Bastian, B., Kuppens, P., Hornsey, M.J., Park, J., Koval P., & Uchida, Y. (2012). Feeling bad about being sad: The role of social expectancies in amplifying negative mood. Emotion, 12, 69-80.PDF
Bastian, B. (2012). Immigration, Multiculturalism and the Changing Face of Australia. In Bretherton, D. & Balvin, N. (Eds.). Peace Psychology in Australia: Dreamings of Peace. Springer Science+Business Media (pp. 55-70) PDF
2011
Bastian, B. (2011). Xenophobia. In D. Christie (Eds). Encyclopedia of Peace Psychology. Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell.
Bastian, B., & Haslam, N. (2011). Experiencing Dehumanization: Cognitive and emotional effects of everyday dehumanization. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 33, 295-303. PDF
Haslam, N., Bastian, B., Laham, S. M., & Loughnan, S. (2011). Morality and humanness. In M. Mikulincer & P. Shaver (Eds.), The psychology of good and evil. Washington, DC: APA Press (pp. 203-218) PDF
Bastian, B., Laham, S., Wilson, S., Haslam, N. & Koval, P. (2011). Blaming, praising and protecting our humanity: The implications of everyday dehumanization for judgments of moral status. British Journal of Social Psychology, 50, 469-483. PDF
Bratanova, B., Loughnan, S., Bastian, B. (2011). The effect of food categorization on the perceived moral standing of animals. Appetite, 57, 193-196. PDF
Bastian, B., Loughnan, S., & Koval, P. (2011). Essentialist beliefs predict automatic motor-responses to social categories. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 14, 559-567. PDF
Bastian, B., Jetten, J., & Fasoli, F. (2011). Cleansing the soul by hurting the flesh: The guilt reducing effect of pain. Psychological Science, 22, 334-335. PDF
2010
Loughnan, S., Haslam, N., Bastian, B. (2010). The role of meat consumption in the denial of moral status and mind to meat animals. Appetite, 55, 156-159 PDF
Bastian B., & Haslam, N. (2010) Excluded from humanity: The dehumanising effects of social ostracism, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 46, 107-113 PDF
Haslam, N., Bastian, B., & Loughnan, S. (2010). Dehumanization/infrahumanization. In J. M. Levine & M. A. Hogg (Eds.) Encyclopedia of group processes & intergroup relations (pp. 188-190). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
2009
Ata, A., Bastian, B., & Lusher, D. (2009). Intergroup contact in context: The mediating role of social norms and group-based perceptions on the contact-prejudice link. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 33, 498-506. PDF
Kashima, Y., Bain, P., Haslam, N., Peters, K., Laham, S., Whelan, J., Bastian, B. & Loughnan, S. (2009). A folk theory of social change. Asian Journal of Social Psychology, 12, 227-246 PDF
Haslam, N., Whelan, J., & Bastian, B. (2009).Big five traits mediate associations between values and subjective well-being. Personality and Individual Differences, 46, 40-42 PDF
2008 and earlier
Bastian, B., & Haslam, N. (2008). Psychological Essentialism and Social Identification: Immigration from two perspectives. Asian Journal of Social Psychology, 11, 127- 140. PDF
Bastian, B., & Haslam, N. (2007). Psychological essentialism and attention allocation. Journal of Social Psychology, 147(5), 531-541. PDF
Haslam, N., Bastian, B., Fox, C., & Whelan, J. (2007) Beliefs about personality change and continuity. Personality and Individual Differences, 42, 1621-1631. PDF
Bastian, B., & Haslam, N. (2006). Psychological essentialism and stereotyping endorsement. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 42, 228-235. PDF
Haslam, N., Bastian, B., Bain, P., & Kashima, Y. (2006). Psychological essentialism, implicit theories, and intergroup relations. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 9, 63-76. PDF
Haslam, N., Bain, P., Douge, L., Lee, M., & Bastian, B. (2005). More human than you: Attributing humanness to self and others. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 89, 937-950. PDF
Haslam, N., Bastian, B., & Bissett, M. (2004). Essentialist beliefs about personality and their implications. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 30, 1661-1673. PDF
Rawlings, D., & Bastian, B. (2002). Painting preference and personality, with particular reference to Gray's behavioural inhibition and behavioural approach systems. Empirical Studies of the Arts, 20(2), 159-175.
I am happy to supervise students in any of the follow areas:
1) Dehumanization: This work focuses on the different ways that people can be dehumanized within everyday contexts, taking the perspective of both the targets of dehumanization, and also the perpetrators. This includes research which investigates the dehumanizing effects of social ostracism and computer mediated interactions such as video games.
2) Meat-eating: Focusing on the 'meat-paradox' this work asks the question of how people can both love animals and love meat! Specifically the work demonstrates that people deny moral rights and mental qualities to animals they eat and this results from processes of dissonance, categorization, framing and is increased when people enjoy eating meat.
3) Postive consequence of physical pain: This research aims to explore the different ways that physically painful experiences may produce benefits for individuals.
4) Social expectancies for emotional experience: In this research we investigate the effects of perceived expectations that people shouldn't feel sad. Daily we are reminded that feeling sad and depressed is an undesirable state, is potentially an illness, and is in many ways representative of failure. We show that these messages prime people to feel bad when they feel sad, ironcially leading to increased negative emotions such as depression and anxiety.
