Watching a life over time

Terror management theory focuses on defenses used to buffer the anxiety caused by the awareness of death. This study attempted to induce an effect opposite to anxiety interpersonal connectedness-using a video clip. This feeling of connectedness was anticipated to decrease the need for the defenses described by terror management theory, and more specifically to lower the need for cultural worldview defense. Participants were assigned to one of two video conditions: the control video condition (K-Web) or the experimental video condition (42-Up). After the video clip was shown, participants judged a list of social transgressions and rated the amount of punishment they felt the transgressor deserved. Individuals with high levels of self-esteem and positive affect were found to be more punitive than their counterparts, but the amount of punishment doled out to the transgressors was lower in the experimental video groups than in the control video groups.