Objective

According to a recent psychological model of defensive gun ownership, the perceived need to own a gun for self-defense corresponds with two independent construals of threat: specific threats, namely the Perceived Lifetime Risk of Assault (PLRA), and diffuse threats, namely the Belief in a Dangerous World (BDW; Stroebe et al., Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 2017, 43(8), 1071). The present study assessed how these threats correspond with two factors known to influence gun ownership: frequency of mass media news exposure and trust in law enforcement to protect citizens from violent crime. These factors represent social information on which people may base their threat perceptions, which could, in turn, influence defensive gun ownership.

Method

The proposed indirect effects model was tested using structural equation modeling (SEM) over two independent online survey samples of U.S. handgun owners (total N = 1,691). The defensive gun ownership concept included measures of self-reported reasons for gun ownership, gun-use beliefs, as well as behavioral self-reports.

Results

Both news exposure and trust in law enforcement indirectly related to defensive gun ownership, via their effects on specific and diffuse threat perceptions. News exposure indirectly related to higher reports of defensive gun ownership, whereas trust in law enforcement was indirectly associated with lower reports of defensive gun ownership.

Conclusions

The results indicate that social information variables relate to defensive gun ownership via threat perceptions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved)