radicalization
Definition
Radicalization refers to a process by which individuals move toward support for, or engagement in, political violence, shaped by psychological, developmental, and contextual factors that vary considerably across populations and ideological contexts. Obsessive passion for an ideology, characterized by self-worth contingent on a cause and the suppression of competing goals, forms a self-reinforcing syndrome with deliberate engagement in radical content, such that the two variables reciprocally predict one another over time rather than forming a simple linear progression toward violence. Adverse childhood experiences, particularly household dysfunction and maltreatment, appear at elevated rates among individuals involved in violent extremism across right-wing, Islamist, white supremacist, and other groups, suggesting that early developmental adversity may contribute to the radicalization process, though the relationship is neither deterministic nor ideologically specific. Among adolescents, within-person increases in political distrust, powerlessness, and dissatisfaction with political institutions are concurrently associated with increases in radical political behavior, with political dissatisfaction and radicalism showing reciprocal reinforcement over time. Jihadi media organizations such as the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan operationalize radicalization as a behavioral intervention by informing audiences about group goals, motivating participation through appeals to religious duty and victimhood, and transmitting perceived capacity for action through repeated exposure to jihadi operations.
Sources: Bélanger et al. (2026), Pammi et al. (2026), Miklikowska & Besta (2026), Jacob et al. (2026)
Related Terms
- political violence (1 shared article)
- behavioral skills (1 shared article)
- IMB model (1 shared article)
- TTP (1 shared article)
- self-efficacy (1 shared article)
- Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (1 shared article)
- terrorism (1 shared article)
- propaganda (1 shared article)
- within-person dynamics (1 shared article)
- deliberate engagement (1 shared article)
- obsessive passion (1 shared article)
- adolescence (1 shared article)
- trauma (1 shared article)
- adverse childhood experiences (1 shared article)
- mental health (1 shared article)
- violent extremism (1 shared article)
- political dissatisfaction (1 shared article)
- political powerlessness (1 shared article)
- political alienation (1 shared article)
- radicalism (1 shared article)
- radical political behavior (1 shared article)
- political trust (1 shared article)
Applications
Radicalization and Obsessive Passion
Obsessive passion, a form of ideological commitment in which self-worth becomes contingent on a cause, is consistently associated with both deliberate engagement in radical content and support for political violence across ideologically diverse samples including Democrats, Republicans, environmental supporters, and Muslims. A three-wave longitudinal study of right-wing Americans found that obsessive passion and deliberate engagement reciprocally predicted one another across six-week intervals, while their coupling with violence support was carried by stable trait-level differences rather than within-person dynamics.
Sources: Bélanger et al. (2026)
Radicalization and Political Alienation
Political alienation, comprising political distrust, powerlessness, and dissatisfaction, is associated with radical political behavior at both the within-person and between-person levels in a five-year panel study of Swedish adolescents aged 13 to 17. Political distrust accounted for the largest share of variance in radicalism at 19%, and the effects of all three alienation dimensions were more pronounced among boys than girls, indicating that gendered pathways into radicalization begin during adolescence.
Sources: Miklikowska & Besta (2026)
Radicalization and Adverse Childhood Experiences
Violent extremism individuals show a higher prevalence of adverse childhood experiences compared to the general population, with household dysfunction the most commonly reported adversity across 23 studies totaling 4,946 individuals. One study found that adverse childhood experiences were associated with involvement in terrorist violence at an odds ratio of 2.08, though direct associations were not significant in all samples, and continuation in education emerged as a potential protective factor moderating this relationship.
Sources: Pammi et al. (2026)
