![]() ![]() The second focuses on social comparison processes and conformity to perceived group norms: individuals in a group conform to what they perceive as the group norm. The first has to do with persuasive argumentation: during group discussion, people are exposed to additional arguments in favour of the position that the average group member was already inclined to take 19, 20. ![]() There are two classes of explanation for this phenomenon. For example, groups that start out mildly risk-seeking become more risk-seeking over time, whereas groups that start out mildly cautious become more cautious over time. It refers to the oft-observed tendency for members of a social group to arrive at a consensus (through group discussion and other forms of social interaction) that is more extreme but in the same direction as the average of their initial opinions on a given issue 19. The concept of group polarization comes from experimental social psychology. One clearly deleterious consequence of polarization is that urgent matters that need not become politicized - such as addressing the public health crisis instigated by COVID-19 and individual decisions about mask-wearing and vaccination - become extremely contentious, leading to serious failures of social cooperation 14, 15, 16, 17, 18. At the same time, intense, seemingly intractable political conflict along multiple lines of divergence might threaten national unity and constructive opportunities for compromise 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13. Some degree of ideological debate and partisan separation is to be expected and might be desirable to ensure that citizens’ voices are well-represented by political elites 3, 5, 6, 7. Democrats felt the rioters should be prosecuted, whereas Republicans were ambivalent, with half of them stating that the riot received too much attention 4. Even in the aftermath of the ‘insurrection’, which injured 138 police officers and killed five people, the American public remained deeply divided. ![]() For years, pundits and observers had predicted that violence and democratic breakdown would inevitably result from the rise in polarization, ‘tribal politics’ and increasing hostility between those who hold liberal attitudes and those who hold conservative attitudes 1, 2, 3. ![]() On 6 January 2021, thousands of supporters of President Donald Trump stormed the US Capitol in an effort to overturn his defeat in the 2020 presidential election. We conclude with a discussion of unanswered questions and ways in which our framework can be extended to the study of culture and institutions. These cognitive–motivational mechanisms interact with social influence processes linked to communication source, message and channel factors, all of which might contribute to increased or decreased polarization. Whereas conservative-rightist ideology is associated with valuing tradition, social order and maintenance of the status quo, liberal-leftist ideology is associated with a push for egalitarian social change. However, a distinct class of system-justifying motives contributes to asymmetric forms of polarization. Ego-justifying and group-justifying motives lead individuals to defend their own pre-existing beliefs and those of their in-group, respectively. In this Review, we provide a conceptual framework to integrate scientific knowledge about cognitive–motivational mechanisms that influence political polarization and the social-communicative contexts in which they are enacted. Despite a vast multidisciplinary literature, no coherent conceptual framework of the microlevel dynamics that increase or decrease polarization has been presented. Democracy is at risk when citizens become so polarized that an ‘us versus them’ mentality dominates. Healthy democratic polities feature competing visions of a good society but also require some level of cooperation and institutional trust. ![]()
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11/16/2022 12:57:00 am
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