Following a presidential election that underscored the nation's deep fissures, Ravi Iyer, PhD, is more convinced than ever of the need for more civility in politics and daily life.
Iyer, a social psychologist and data scientist, is the executive director of CivilPolitics.org, a website that supports research on intergroup relations and does outreach to bring research-based methods to civic groups that want to encourage civil political discussion—which he defines as "the ability to disagree productively with others, respecting their sincerity and decency." Iyer is also the chief data scientist for Ranker, a consumer opinion website.
Iyer spoke to the Monitor about the rise of "tribal politics" and why it's so important to make personal connections with the people we disagree with most strongly.
In a pre-election opinion pieceopens in new window in the Wall Street Journal, you wrote that tribalism and tribal politics are dividing the country. Why is that?
Humans are unique [among animals] in that we group together into groups of thousands or millions of people that are not kin, and these groups compete. We're so invested in competition that in the absence of conflict, we invent conflict—sports is the classic example. And so our tribal politics are not surprising. It's what we've evolved for. It's what we do naturally. We can't decide not to compete and form tribes. We kind of have to work with what we're given.
If this has always been true about human nature, then what has changed in politics in the last decade or two?
Increasingly people are choosing to live in communities that are more separate—liberals live in certain areas and conservatives live in certain areas. So we don't encounter people from the other side, and our tribalism reflects the separateness that we see in our daily lives.
Even our media and social media spheres are separated. Facebook algorithms are designed to give us more of what we click on and more of what we choose. So you're training the algorithm by virtue of what you pay attention to and click on to give you more of the same.
So, we just don't even encounter each other [in person or online], and it becomes hard to believe that there is this whole other group that's so large, yet you had no idea they existed. And that makes it harder to empathize with them and realize that you actually do have some things in common.
What can people do to decrease this tribalism?
We have a few main recommendations: Focus on relationships first, think about common goals and focus on common goals rather than competitive goals.
Honestly, some of it is common sense—you can find it in children's books—but we often don't practice what we know is true. Instead we think, "If I just have enough facts on my side, I can rationally convince other people to believe what I believe."
That rarely works. Our advice would be, try to build the relationship first. Don't lead with politics. Start with the things you have in common, that will both build a relationship and build a more cooperative spirit. And then if you want to talk about politics after that, it might go better.
I don't think many of us have had the experience where you have a rational argument and someone becomes convinced by something amazing that you've said. When people are dug in, they're dug in. So if you can get them liking you first, then that's probably half the battle.
The other thing is focusing on cooperative goals. You know, I myself lean liberal, I am disappointed in these election results. But I read a statement by Elizabeth Warren, who said that while she disagrees with most of [Donald] Trump's stances, she would work with him to help workers who have been left behind by the economy.
So if you can focus on things you agree on—and that goes at both the micro level and the macro level, at the dinner table and at the political level—then that will also be increasingly less rancorous. And that goodwill may bleed over into more productive discussions about things that you might not agree on.
But how do you try to find some agreement with someone who you don't have much common ground with, who may even be working to undermine what you hold dear?
Yes, we are all social creatures and we are only capable of so much putting our feelings aside. But you don't have to agree with people, you just have to learn to see them as whole people. Not as good versus evil, which leaves very little room for compromise, but as complex people. [If you can put yourself] in their shoes, you might see where they're coming from.
What specifically can psychologists do to help bridge these divides?
I think just highlighting the message that relationships can change people. If you ask people what has ever changed their mind about anything, invariably it's not a policy argument, it's not a statistic, it's a relationship. I met someone who I cared about, who was facing this issue and it humanized it for me, and I realized something had to change. I hear that story in different ways and about different issues all the time.
Psychologists have a role to play in the technology community as well. There's a lot of data science that goes on in technology, creating the algorithms that create the echo chamber in your social media feed.
Someone has to decide: What will be the effect of making comments anonymous or not anonymous, or showing these kinds of news stories versus those kinds of news stories? What's the effect when we prioritize clicks versus shares in a social media feed? These are areas where psychologists could help the technology community.
