Arie Kruglanski is a Distinguished University Professor at the University of Maryland whose career spans human judgment, motivation, goal pursuit, cognition, group behavior, and radicalization.
He has published more than 300 articles, chapters and books, and in 2024 received the Association for Psychological Science's William James Fellow Award for lifetime contributions to psychology. His most significant contribution: the Quest for Significance Kruglanski's breakthrough idea is Significance Quest Theory: human beings have a fundamental motivation to feel that they have worth, dignity, respect and meaning.
His 2022 formulation describes the quest for significance as the need to have social worth. That idea becomes especially powerful when connected to Side Quests to Significance work. Kruglanski essentially asks: What makes a person desperately want to matter? Side Quest work asks a complementary question: What if we intentionally discover the things that make us matter—to ourselves, to others and to the world—and pursue them? Enjoy hearing about the fascinating bridge.
The hopeful side Kruglanski originally became especially prominent for applying the significance framework to radicalization and violent extremism. His 3N model says three things can converge:
Need — I need to matter.
Narrative — Here is a cause that will make me significant.
Network — Here are people who validate that cause and reinforce my identity.
That framework has been applied to understanding radicalization across different cultures and conflict zones. And here's where Dr. Kruglanski's work becomes especially relevant to Truly Significant and Side Quests: The same human hunger to matter can be channeled toward destruction—or contribution. Kruglanski's recent work explicitly explores how the universal desire for belonging and recognition can lead people toward either constructive contribution or destructive extremism.
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