Seize and freeze: Openness to Experience shapes judgments of societal threat

•Examined how Openness to Experience shapes social worldviews.•Extends the Dual Process Model of ideology and prejudice using an experimental design.•Adapts a classic anchoring and adjustment paradigm.•Tested the effect of Openness on anchoring in two studies.•Indicates that low Openness increases the tendency to be anchored by threat-relevant cues.

The Dual Process Model of ideology and prejudice (DPM) proposes specific information-processing mechanisms by which broad-bandwidth personality shapes social worldviews. We adapt a classic anchoring and adjustment paradigm and show that Openness to Experience interacts with exposure to information about safety and threat to shape judgments of societal threat and danger. Those low in Openness to Experience were more sensitive to anchor information about the proportion of dangerous and threatening people in society (Study 1). The moderating effect of Openness to Experience on dangerous worldview estimates was due specifically to an intellect or cognitive component of this personality trait, rather than an aesthetic component (Study 2). These results indicate low Openness increases the tendency to be anchored by threat-relevant cues.