Great Expectations? Self-Expansion Motivation, Social Self-Efficacy, and Interaction Expectations Affect Interest in Cross-Group Interactions

While high motivation to expand the self may lead to interest in cross-ethnic interactions, social self-efficacy may moderate this effect, such that those high in social self-efficacy will show a stronger effect of self-expansion motivation on interest in cross-group interactions. Study 1 failed to show the predicted interaction, but did show that social self-efficacy played a significant role in predicting interest in cross-group interactions. Study 2 extended Study 1, manipulating participants’ expectations about the success of the interaction. The primary interaction emerged: for those with high social self-efficacy, higher self-expansion motivation led to more interest in cross-group interactions. For those low in social self-efficacy, interest in cross-group interactions was uninfluenced by self-expansion motivation. The manipulation of expectations produced only an interaction with social self-efficacy, where higher self-efficacy lead to greater interest in cross-group interactions when expectations were positive, but did not influence interest in cross-group interactions when expectations were ambiguous.