Gender studies have often been criticized for undermining family and religious values. In this paper, we argue that these criticisms exhibit the characteristics of conspiracy theories. We define gender conspiracy beliefs as convictions that gender studies and gender-equality activists represent an ideology secretly designed to harm traditional values and social arrangements. In two studies conducted among Catholics in Poland (Study 1 N= 1019; Study 2 N= 223), we examined the prevalence of gender conspiracy beliefs and their psychological concomitants. We hypothesized that gender conspiracy beliefs should be associated with a defensive identification with one’s religious group, captured by religious collective narcissism. In both studies, Catholic collective narcissism was demonstrated to be a robust predictor of gender conspiracy beliefs. We additionally demonstrated that Catholic collective narcissism predicted outgroup hostility, and this effect was mediated by gender conspiracy beliefs. We discuss the implications for gender-based prejudice.

Objective: We examined the effects of control motivation on in‐group positivity. Past research suggests that people compensate for low personal control by increasing support for social in‐groups. We predicted that the effect of personal control on in‐group positivity would depend on the type of in‐group positivity. Low personal control should increase compensatory, narcissistic in‐group positivity, whereas high personal control should increase secure, non‐narcissistic in‐group positivity.Method: These hypotheses were tested in a cross‐sectional survey (Study 1 N = 1,083, 54% female, M_age = 47.68), two experiments (Study 2 N = 105, 50% female, M_age = 32.05; Study 3 N = 154, 40% female, M_age = 29.93), and a longitudinal survey (Study 4 N = 398, 51% female, M_age = 32.05).Results: In all studies, personal control was negatively associated with narcissistic in‐group positivity but positively associated with non‐narcissistic in‐group positivity. The longitudinal survey additionally showed that the positive relationship between personal control and non‐narcissistic in‐group positivity was reciprocal. Moreover, both types of in‐group positivity differentially mediated between personal control and out‐group attitudes: Narcissistic in‐group positivity predicted negative attitudes, and non‐narcissistic positivity predicted positive attitudes.Conclusions: These findings highlight the role of individual motivation in fostering different types of in‐group positivity and intergroup outcomes.