The Irish Journal of Psychology 2010, Vol. 31, No. 3-4, pp. 151-170 Copyright 2010 by The Psychological Society of Ireland ISSN 0303-3910 Address correspondence to: Masi Noor, Department of Applied Social Sciences, Psychology, Canterbury Christ Church University, Canterbury, CT1 1QU, Kent, UK. Email: masi.noor@canterbury.ac.uk Intergroup identity perceptions and their implications for intergroup forgiveness: The Common Ingroup Identity Model and its efficacy in the field Masi Noor 1 , Rupert Brown 2 , Laurence Taggart 3 , Ana Fernandez 1 , & Sharon Coen 1 1 Psychology Programme, Applied Social Sciences, Canterbury Christ Church University 2 School of Psychology, University of Sussex 3 Nursing Research Institute, University of Ulster Three studies revisited the application of the Common Ingroup Identity Model (CIIM) to the Northern Irish conflict and shed light on the factors that potentially limit the scope of the CIIM. Study 1 (N = 61) showed that both conflict protagonists unanimously viewed “Northern Ireland” as the most inclusive superordinate category relative to other viable categories. Employing a longitudinal design, Study 2 (N = 67/43) examined the stability of the intergroup identity perceptions that the Northern Irish Protestant and Catholic groups hold in relation to the superordinate category “Northern Ireland”. Moreover, Study 2 also provided evidence that the Protestant group engages in ingroup projection (i.e. perceiving a large overlap between their ingroup identity category and the superordinate category). Study 3 (N = 307) successfully replicated previous research revealing that, while the Catholic group’s willingness to forgive the outgroup benefits from identifying with the superordinate category, the Protestants’ willingness to forgive the outgroup does not. Results are discussed in terms of their theoretical and practical implications. Introduction Recent work in social psychology has expanded the study of intergroup relations from its traditional focus on the reduction of negative psychological outcomes (e.g. intergroup bias; Hewstone, Rubin & Willis, 2002) to the promotion of positive outcomes (e.g. forgiveness; Nadler & Liviatan, 2006; Wohl & Branscombe, 2005). Building on this work, Noor, Brown, Gonzalez, Manzi and Lewis (2008) reported a series of field studies in which they identified a number of social psychological predictors of intergroup