The Social Identity and Groups Network (SIGN) brings together leading researchers from around the world to collaborate in the study of social identity and group processes. Members of the network conduct cutting-edge research that explores the importance of social identity for a range of social, clinical, organisational and political topics. This work has broad theoretical and applied relevance. Co
re members of SIGN are based in the School of Psychology at The University of Queensland, but the Social Identity and Groups Network has a strong international focus, with collaborators spread throughout Europe, North America, and Asia. SIGN’s social psychologists work on a range of topics to which group life and social identity is central. These include stereotyping and prejudice, stigma and discrimination, deviance and dissent, tyranny and resistance. The network’s clinical and health psychologists examine the importance of groups for health and well-being. Their programmatic work examines important connections between social identity and mental, emotional, and cognitive health. This work addresses topics such as depression, aging, and addiction. The group’s organisational psychologists explore the various ways in which organizational functioning is structured by people’s membership in social groups. Their work focuses on processes such as motivation, and influence and leadership, and communication, cooperation and control. SIGN’s political psychologists examine a range of process related to leadership and governance in the public sphere. For example, they examine the ways in which policy makers seek to influence different groups (e.g., through persuasion or via ‘nudging’), as well as the efficacy of these strategies across a range of contexts. A defining feature of the Social Identity and Groups Network is that, while its members’ work has a clear theoretical focus, it is not constrained by boundaries between methods, topics, or disciplines. Instead, our work is genuinely interdisciplinary. As a result, collaborations not only span different subdisciplines of psychology, but also involves productive dialogue with political scientists, sociologists, economists, epidemiologists.
