Honor to the core: Measuring implicit honor ideology endorsement

• We examined if honor orientations can be assessed at an implicit level.
• Explicit honor endorsers scored higher on the implicit honor ideology measure.
• High implicit and explicit honor endorsers had better memory of the honor primes.
• The explicit and implicit measures tap into different aspects of the honor construct.

People from honor-oriented societies emphasize the maintenance and defense of reputation. Prior research has used geographical distinctions or self-report scales to identify honor-oriented regions and people. The current study examined if honor orientations can be assessed at an implicit level through the use of the Affect Misattribution Procedure ( Payne, Cheng, Govorun, & Stewart, 2005). People high in explicit honor ideology scored significantly higher on a newly developed implicit honor ideology measure than people low in explicit honor. In addition, people high in implicit honor ideology demonstrated a better memory for honor- and dishonor-related words on a surprise memory test. These results support the possibility that honor ideology can be measured implicitly and open up a new realm for research on honor cultures.