In summary, crises like the pandemic cause negative emotions like anger and anxiety but both lasting social-structural positions and, more importantly, economic affectedness and downward mobility determine who experiences these emotions most intensely. (8/8)

we show that more immediate and situated appraisals arise in crisis conditions. By asking about specific objects of anger and anxiety we find that income loss due to the pandemic especially increased the likelihood to express anger over political measures and anxiety regarding other's behavior (7/8)

 While differences in emotional experience across different social strata or income brackets are typically explained through lasting conditions, emotion norms, different forms of emotional capital or the ecology of social encounters linked to social positions, (6/8)

Further, effects of overall income and income loss caused by the pandemic are largely independent, which suggests that different mechanisms of emotional stratification are at play. (5/8)

Building on this research, our study shows that in the context of crises the immediate economic affectedness and in particular downward social mobility has a more robust effect on the anger and anxiety people experience as compared to overall income levels. (4/8)

It is already well known that emotions are socially stratified, which means their frequency and intensity depends on a person's socioeconomic standing in society.

In the sociology of emotions this has typically been shown for relatively stable socioeconomic markers like occupation or income. (3/8)

Together with Idayane Soares and @cvscheve.bsky.social, I explore how anger and anxiety during the crisis were experienced differently depending on individual's income level and their economic affectedness. (2/8)

Our new paper on the link between social inequalities and emotional experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic is finally out!!!

doi.org/10.1332/2631...

(1/8)

Mein Interview mit der Rheinischen Post zu politischen Emotionen:

rp-online.de/politik/deut...

In my view, it is more fruitful to understand conspiracy theories as cultural products that facilitate the transformation of powerless individual emotions into collective and political emotions. This capacity explains both their subjective appeal and their political success.

While these portrayals and approaches offer convenient pretenses to reject conspiracy theories out of hand as overly emotional, they offer little insight into their significance as social and affective phenomena.

People believing in conspiracy theories are often casually described as paranoid, anxious, or angry. Similarly, existing research understands conspiracy theories mostly as an individual-level strategy to cope with negative emotions.

My new paper on emotions and conspiracy theories is finally out!

doi.org/10.1111/jtsb...

...und dabei von den viel weniger unterhaltsamen Machtübernahmen ablenkt, die real und in der Gegenwart stattfinden.