Uploaded June 2016 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
This election is divisive, both in & between parties. Unfortunately, our brains don't work too well in groups.
*Links for the Curious*
Evidence of an increasing division between political parties in the US - annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.polisci.9.070204.105138
Tajfel et al's 1971 paper demonstrating that even totally arbitrary grouping does weird stuff to human brains - morilab.net/gakushuin/Tajfel_et_al_1971.pdf
A study about how ingroup/outgroup bias can color what characteristics people are quick to assign to their ingroup/outgroup - sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103199913999
Evidence that we show greater affinity for ingroup members who promote the group's distinctiveness over those who try to be more evenhanded - researchgate.net/publication/234023326_Castelli_Carraro_EJSP_2010
A study showing that simply framing a political argument as coming from the ingroup increases its acceptance dramatically - sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103116301056
Groups also make us prone to riskier behavior, arriving at more extreme conclusions together than we would on our own - https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/handle/2027.42/108371
This election is divisive, both in & between parties. Unfortunately, our brains don't work too well in groups.
*Links for the Curious*
Evidence of an increasing division between political parties in the US - annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.polisci.9.070204.105138
Tajfel et al's 1971 paper demonstrating that even totally arbitrary grouping does weird stuff to human brains - morilab.net/gakushuin/Tajfel_et_al_1971.pdf
A study about how ingroup/outgroup bias can color what characteristics people are quick to assign to their ingroup/outgroup - sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103199913999
Evidence that we show greater affinity for ingroup members who promote the group's distinctiveness over those who try to be more evenhanded - researchgate.net/publication/234023326_Castelli_Carraro_EJSP_2010
A study showing that simply framing a political argument as coming from the ingroup increases its acceptance dramatically - sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103116301056
Groups also make us prone to riskier behavior, arriving at more extreme conclusions together than we would on our own - https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/handle/2027.42/108371
