This study explores narratives about encounters with Europeans in a Congolese sample to study the impact of their meaning on their social distance attitudes towards Europeans. Separate hierarchical regression models revealed that social distance is predicted by closure and redemption, and by the perceived heterogeneity of whiteness, but not by contamination. Yet, narratives with both low levels of closure and contamination predict greater social distance. Surprisingly, commitment to own ethnic identity was not found to be a significant predictor.
