Significance
Informal political discussions with peers can increase trust in democracy and improve understanding of self and others. However, these benefits do not often materialize because people tend to shy away from political discussions and because friendship networks rarely expose highly divergent political views. In a large-scale experiment, we overcome these limitations by matching participants to peers selected for sharing common interests and demographics and exposing them to a personal message about a divisive political topic: wealth redistribution. As a result, support for redistributive policies increased and polarization decreased. Furthermore, feeling close to a peer greatly increased the assimilation of a political message. Our results suggest that incidental similarities may cold-start cross-cutting political arguments and increase consensus on divisive topics.
Abstract
In a large-scale, preregistered experiment on informal political communication, we algorithmically matched participants, varying two dimensions: 1) the degree of incidental similarity on nonpolitical features; and 2) their stance agreement on a contentious political topic. Matched participants were first shown a computer-generated social media profile of their match highlighting all the shared nonpolitical features; then, they read a short, personal, but argumentative, essay written by their match about the reduction of inequality via redistribution of wealth by the government. We show that...
Read Full Story: https://www.pnas.org/content/118/52/e2112552118
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