Social identities promote well-being because they satisfy global psychological needs

Abstract

Social identities are known to improve well-being, but why is this? We argue that this is because they satisfy basic psychological needs, specifically, the need to belong, the need for self-esteem, the need for control and the need for meaningful existence. A longitudinal study (N = 70) revealed that gain in identity strength was associated with increased need satisfaction over 7 months. A cross-sectional study (N = 146) revealed that social identity gain and social identity loss predicted increased and reduced need satisfaction, respectively. Finally, an experiment (N = 300) showed that, relative to a control condition, social identity gain increased need satisfaction and social identity lo..