Identity threat triggers defensive identity-management behaviors aimed at preserving a positive self

Evidence

Finally, there is a category of theories that focus on the needs and motives underlying identity processes which offer an explanation as to why maintaining and defending, revising and constructing a social or personal identity is important to people in the first place. According to these theories, a range of psychological needs motivates people to identify with those groups, ideologies, characteristics, social roles etc. which have the capacity to fulfill them. Moreover, to maintain a positive sense of self (i.e. an identity that fulfills one’s psychological needs), these theories propose that in response to factors that threaten their identity, people engage in identity management behaviors, including reconstruction and defense mechanisms. — Lea Echelmeyer, Anne-Marie Slotboom, and Frank Weerman, The Putative Effect of Identity on…, 25

Categorization

• XREF: Named here as needs/motives theories — the ~quarter of studies in the synthesis and the mechanism most proximate to ‘negative identity’ defense. — connects to: Identity anxiety is really worry about being valued by others — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 290; Identity-based depolarization interventions can carry unintended side effects — Rachel Hartman et al., Interventions to Reduce Partisan…, 37