There has been a lack of research that explores the mechanisms of identity framing the perceptions of economic and political issues and the self-perceptions as Europeans that might have important implications for the attitudes towards the EU.The projects focus on the economic and political implication of identity processes by bringing the latest resources of social psychological research on identity and the highly topical issues explored by political science.
Specifically, the main goals of the project are: (a)to demonstrate the relationship between the existence or absence of an European identity and the perception of legitimacy of EU governance and wealth sharing across European countries, (b)to look at the social psychological mechanisms regarding the relationship between European identity, legitimacy perceptions and political attitudes to the EU, and (c)to develop more unobtrusive ways of assessing the degree of incorporation of the European category into the self of European citizens.
The project includes a program of experimental studies designed to pinpoint the causal mechanisms involved at the social psychological level, as well as an extensive longitudinal study to look at the development of European identity in the current economic context.