Everybody needs a hero

People have always had heroes. In Ancient Rome, charioteers were so adored that monuments were erected in their honour. But how does respect for role models affect our psychology? Dr Aulona Ulqinaku has spent nearly a decade researching exactly that.

For Aulona, heroes are strong women. One day she might mention her mother; the next, she may talk about the Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti.

Heroism is a topic Aulona, an Associate Professor of Marketing and Programme Director for our Consumer Analytics and Marketing Strategy MSc, has thought about more than most.

She published a 2020 paper on the benefits of heroes – the findings of which have potential applications right across society. But when Aulona embarked on the project, she had only a hypothesis built on curiosity.

It all came from a question.

Aulona credits her supervisor, Gülen Sarial Abi, for providing the initial spark of interest in the role of heroes.

“In the second year of my PhD, Gülen asked ‘what could help us overcome fear of death?’, and we began discussing heroes,” she explained.

Aulona knew that people sometimes engage in unhealthy consumption to mitigate the impact of psychological threats – an “eat like there’s no tomorrow” effect.

Gradually, an idea took shape.

“I proposed that because heroes are known for their personal power, they increase perceptions of personal power in others. Effectively, thinking about your heroes makes you feel like you can follow in their footsteps.”

It was time to test the hypothesis. But first, what is a ‘hero’, anyway?

“We defined it as anyone – a person, a superhero, someone you know or don’t know – who fights to make a positive difference in someone’s life, winning the respect and admiration of the masses in the process,” Dr Ulqinaku said.

With that settled, Aulona could set about planning a range of studies. It was 2016. Global terrorism was all over the news, with attack after attack reminding people of mortality.

Aulona and her team analysed more than 150,000 tweets published immediately after specific terror attacks in Turkey, Germany and Israel between 24 November 2016 and 8 January 2017. Software helped pick out keywords associated with heroes, death and power.

As Aulona expected, the social media findings supported her theory.

It was an exciting first step, but more research was essential.

“So we surveyed 200 participants online,” Aulona said. “They were split into two groups: 100 were asked to think about their own death; another hundred to remember a recent incident. Then those groups were halved again; 50 of them thought about a hero, the rest about an acquaintance.”

Finally, everyone imagined a bowl containing a thousand M&Ms and a second bowl containing a thousand grapes.

Participants who had been reminded of a hero had a lower intention to eat the M&Ms when under the mortality threat condition than those who had merely thought of an acquaintance.

The next stage of Aulona’s research would be by far the most challenging.

“There’s a gap between what people say and what they go on to do,” she said. “We needed a study in the field.”

And that’s how Aulona and her husband found themselves in a park in Milan on 2 November 2017 – All Saints’ Day, or Day of the Dead – pushing their newborn child in a pram while trying to survey members of the public.

“We asked them how much they were thinking about death, plus the extent to which they felt their life was threatened. Some were prompted to think of a hero, but others were not.”

“At the end, we offered up a bowl of candy and said it was a thank you for taking part. But we were really interested in how many people would take.”

After the experiment was repeated later, the team could draw their conclusions – chiefly that people who had thought about their heroes consumed fewer candies than those who had not.

Collecting the data had taken lots of effort and patience, and not just from Aulona.

“My husband supported me when I was working long hours,” she said. “Our parents flew to Italy to do the childcare. My friends helped me capture responses. And Gülen was always there to give me support.”