The general fault in our fault lines

Abstract

A pervading global narrative suggests that political polarisation is increasing in the US and around the world. Beliefs in increased polarisation impact individual and group behaviours regardless of whether they are accurate or not. One driver of polarisation are beliefs about how members of the out-group perceive us, known as group meta-perceptions. A 2020 study by Lees and Cikara in US samples suggests that not only are out-group meta-perceptions highly inaccurate, but informing people of this inaccuracy reduces negative beliefs about the out-group. Given the importance of these findings for understanding and mitigating polarisation, it is essential to test to what extent they generalise to other countries. We assess that generalisability by replicating two of the original experiments in 10,207 participants from 26 countries in the first experiment and 10 in the second. We do this by studying local group divisions, which we refer to as fault lines. In line with our hypotheses, results show that the pattern found in the US broadly generalises, with greater heterogeneity explained by specific policies rather than between-country differences. The replication of a simple disclosure intervention in the second experiment yielded a modest reduction in negative motive attributions to the out-group, similar to the original study. These findings indicate first that inaccurate and negative group meta-perceptions are exhibited in a large number of countries, not only the US, and that informing individuals of their misperceptions can yield positive benefits for intergroup relations. The generalisability of these findings highlights a robust phenomenon with major implications for political discourse worldwide.

Interventions Reducing Affective Polarization Do Not Necessarily Improve Anti-Democratic Attitudes

“…The second intervention involves correcting exaggerated misperceptions about the extent of outparty opposition to inparty collective political behaviors (16; see 14 for a 7 DEPOLARIZATION INTERVENTIONS AND ANTI-DEMOCRATIC ATTITUDES similar intervention). This misperception correction intervention makes clear the other party is not as much of a threat to one's party agenda as if often believed; it has been replicated across 25 countries (19). Both interventions are compared to a control group.…”

“…There is great concern about rising affective polarization because its presumed negative consequences may be uniquely harmful or destabilizing for democratic societies -for example by stimulating support for undemocratic candidates and practices, or by fomenting political violence (e.g., 2, 8-13). In light of the presumed dire consequences of affective polarization, academics and practitioners have invested a great deal of energy in developing interventions that reduce affective polarization, typically using outcomes based on sentiment towards opposing partisans (e.g., 12,[14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25]. This body of work has uncovered numerous effective approaches for reducing affective polarization, tools that offer hope for maintainingor restoringdemocratic norms and practices.…”

Correcting Inaccurate Metaperceptions Reduces Americans’ Support for Partisan Violence

“…One promising line of work comes from recent studies showing that American partisans' "metaperceptions" of rival partisans -i.e., their perceptions of rival partisans' views -tend to be highly inaccurate. For example, research finds that American partisans believe that outgroup partisans have higher levels of prejudice and dehumanization towards the ingroup [6], are less supportive of democratic norms [7], and are more willing to obstruct the ingroup for political gain [8,9] than they are in reality. These beliefs have the potential to escalate if partisans' reciprocate the animosity they perceive among their rival partisans.…”

“…These beliefs have the potential to escalate if partisans' reciprocate the animosity they perceive among their rival partisans. However, the effects of exaggerated metaperceptions can be reduced through informational corrections [8,9]. At least two bodies of research suggest that partisans would overestimate rival partisans' support for partisan violence.…”

Partisan biases in social information use

“…Note, though, that within the groups of both Democratic-and Republican-identifying participants, there are substantial individual differences in ingroup bias and motivated reasoning. To understand the psychological mechanisms underlying these biases in social information use, it would be useful to examine their links with individual characteristics beyond party preference, including reflective thinking style [25,40,41], intelligence [42,43], and perceptions of outgroup hostility [44].…”