Meaning buffers right-wing authoritarian responses to societal threat via the mediation of loss of perceived control

• The societal threat–RWA relation is mediated by the loss of perceived control.
• The loss of perceived control–RWA relation is moderated by meaning.
• Meaning buffers the effect exerted by societal threat to safety on RWA.

The literature shows that exposure to societal threat stemming from criminality can elicit an increase in right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) via the mediation of the loss of perceived control. In this study, we investigated whether the perception of meaning can act as a buffering factor for such process, performing an experiment with 316 Italian university students (67.8% women; mean age = 25.81, SD = 9.18). A moderated mediation model showed that the loss of perceived control mediated the relation between societal threat stemming from criminality and RWA, but that the second link was significant only among people low in meaning. Limitations, implications and possible developments of this research are discussed.