Emerging collective identity and sustained protest engagement: Evidence from the 2024–2025 student protests in Serbia

Following the tragic collapse of the Novi Sad railway station canopy in November 2024, which claimed 16 lives, Serbia has witnessed a prolonged wave of student-led protests and university blockades. Building on the SIMCA and EMSICA as theoretical frameworks, this study examined psychological predictors of student engagement in the 2024–2025 student-led protests in Serbia. The study relied on a cross-sectional correlational design. We surveyed student protesters (N = 504; 69.6% female; Mage = 21.86; SDage = 2.78) who were actively involved in university blockades across Serbia. Measures were taken of various forms of current protest engagement, intended future engagement, collective identity, anger and moral outrage, as well as perceived group efficacy. Regression analyses showed that identification with fellow student protesters significantly predicted current protest behavior, including participation in protest actions (β = .26, p < .001) and involvement in plenary assemblies (β = .26, p < .001), while identification (β = .22, p = .007), perceived group efficacy (β = .32, p < .001) and violation of moral beliefs (β = -.142, p = .012) predicted intentions to remain engaged. Path models testing both the SIMCA and EMSICA models showed unsatisfactory fit to the data. This study expands the extant literature by studying a real-life, ongoing massive protest that has profoundly affected one country’s political life. The findings support the importance of social identity as a key driver of collective action, highlighting how a sense of belonging to the group of protesting students motivates sustained participation.