Promoting the Middle East Peace Process by Changing Beliefs About Group Malleability

Halperin, Eran; Russell, Alexandra G.; Trzesniewski, Kali H.; Gross, James J.; Dweck, Carol S.

doi:10.1126/science.1202925

Cited by 289 publications

(296 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…A successful unfreezing process should increase the individual's openness to previously contradictory views regarding the conflict, the adversary, and the in-group (5). With this challenge, a growing body of research has attempted to identify methods of intervention that can unfreeze deeply rooted conflict-supporting narratives among groups in conflict (11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16).…”

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confidence: 99%

Paradoxical thinking as a new avenue of intervention to promote peace

Hameiri

Porat

Bar‐Tal

et al. 2014

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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In societies involved in an intractable conflict, there are strong socio-psychological barriers that contribute to the continuation and intractability of the conflict. Based on a unique field study conducted in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, we offer a new avenue to overcome these barriers by exposing participants to a long-term paradoxical intervention campaign expressing extreme ideas that are congruent with the shared ethos of conflict. Results show that the intervention, although counterintuitive, led participants to express more conciliatory attitudes regarding the conflict, particularly among participants with center and right political orientation. Most importantly, the intervention even influenced participants' actual voting patterns in the 2013 Israeli general elections: Participants who were exposed to the paradoxical intervention, which took place in proximity to the general elections, reported that they tended to vote more for dovish parties, which advocate a peaceful resolution to the conflict. These effects were long lasting, as the participants in the intervention condition expressed more conciliatory attitudes when they were reassessed 1 y after the intervention. Based on these results, we propose a new layer to the general theory of persuasion based on the concept of paradoxical thinking.attitude change | psychological intervention I n recent years, the study of intractable conflicts has gained prominence within the social sciences (1, 2). This type of conflict is very difficult to resolve peacefully because it is fueled by socio-psychological barriers that play a key role in this impasse (3, 4). One major implication of these barriers is the tendency to freeze on conflict supporting societal beliefs and attitudes, and thus preserve hostility between the adversaries (5, 6). [Societal beliefs are defined as shared cognitions by society members that address themes and issues that society members are particularly occupied with, and which contribute to their sense of uniqueness (7).]Freezing is characterized by rigidity and close-mindedness, such that information incongruent with the reigning cognitiveemotional structure is likely to be ignored, rejected, misinterpreted, or forgotten, whereas congruent information is accepted as valid (8, 9; see also ref. 10). In fact, cognitive freezing encourages tunnel vision with respect to the conflict and the means to resolve it. Thus, one major challenge for scholars and peace activists is to overcome these deeply rooted socio-psychological barriers by unfreezing the held conflict supporting collective narratives. A successful unfreezing process should increase the individual's openness to previously contradictory views regarding the conflict, the adversary, and the in-group (5). With this challenge, a growing body of research has attempted to identify methods of intervention that can unfreeze deeply rooted conflict-supporting narratives among groups in conflict (11-16).In principle, most current interventions directly provide information th...

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confidence: 99%

Paradoxical thinking as a new avenue of intervention to promote peace

Hameiri

Porat

Bar‐Tal

et al. 2014

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“…The tremendous costs of conflict-the human lives lost, the suffering endured, and the resources wasted on conflict-have made humans resourceful not only at warfare, but also at peacemaking (1)(2)(3)(4)(5). Although the simplest context for conflict is two parties who manage their disagreement privately, disconnected from other individuals and groups, the more common context for conflict is two parties who manage their disagreement publicly, surrounded by numerous third parties (6).…”

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Selfish third parties act as peacemakers by transforming conflicts and promoting cooperation

Halevy

Halali

2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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The tremendous costs of conflict have made humans resourceful not only at warfare but also at peacemaking. Although third parties have acted as peacemakers since the dawn of history, little is known about voluntary, informal third-party intervention in conflict. Here we introduce the Peacemaker Game, a novel experimental paradigm, to model and study the interdependence between disputants and third parties in conflict. In the game, two disputants choose whether to cooperate or compete and a third party chooses whether or not to intervene in the conflict. Intervention introduces side payments that transform the game disputants are playing; it also introduces risk for the third party by making it vulnerable to disputants' choices. Six experiments revealed three robust effects: (i) The mere possibility of third-party intervention significantly increases cooperation in interpersonal and intergroup conflicts; (ii) reducing the risk to third parties dramatically increases intervention rates, to everyone's benefit; and (iii) disputants' cooperation rates are consistently higher than third parties' intervention rates. These findings explain why, how, and when self-interested third parties facilitate peaceful conflict resolution.conflict | dispute resolution | war and peace | incentives | social dilemma "The greatest honor history can bestow is the title of peacemaker."Richard Nixon,

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“…These and similar issues ought to be addressed not only from a historical and legal or transitional justice perspective but also from a social psychological angle which concerns itself with issues of ameliorating intergroup relations. How do various actors involved in the process of history teaching (teachers, ministries of education, civil society organizations, historians) see these issues in relation to a social psychological understanding of reconciliation which implies both a process of positive changes in relations between adversaries and an outcome characterized by humanization, acceptance of both similarity and difference, outgroup malleability (Halperin et al 2011), responsibility for ingroup past wrongdoing (leach et al 2013), intergroup contact, prejudice reduction and the cultivation of trust? These processes of humanization, empathy, intergroup contact and dialogue are just a few socio-psychological pillars which can help individuals and groups to become more inclusive, openminded and accepting of the Other and as a consequence contribute to sustainable peace (Čehajić and Brown 2010).…”

Section: Conflict Transformation Conflict Resolution and Reconciliatmentioning

confidence: 99%

Conflict Transformation and History Teaching: Social Psychological Theory and Its Contributions

Psaltis

Carretero

Čehajić‐Clancy

2017

History Education and Conflict Transformation

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Promoting the Middle East Peace Process by Changing Beliefs About Group Malleability

Cited by 289 publications

References 14 publications

Paradoxical thinking as a new avenue of intervention to promote peace

Paradoxical thinking as a new avenue of intervention to promote peace

Selfish third parties act as peacemakers by transforming conflicts and promoting cooperation

Conflict Transformation and History Teaching: Social Psychological Theory and Its Contributions

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