Why Political Conversations Go Wrong-and How to Fix Them

"Why Political Conversations Feel So Hopeless Political life in the United States is increasingly marked by interparty animus, including tendencies toward dehumanization. Partisans can seem to prefer distance to dialogue and moral judgment to intellectual engagement. Such unproductive habits steadily erode both the willingness to engage politically and the capacity to consider ideas that conflict with one's own. It's easy to assume that political conversations are hopeless because nothing you say is likely to change anyone's mind."

"Every holiday season brings with it the same warning: Unless everyone is on the same political side, leave your politics at the door. And every few years, I write another article explaining that rather than trying to convince your wrong-headed relatives to change their minds, listening with genuine curiosity is the answer. Now, new research by psychologist Todd Kashdan and his colleagues indicates that the real obstacle to cross-partisan understanding and depolarization may not be disagreement itself"

Curiosity correlates with openness, humility, and improved political conversations. People greatly underestimate how open-minded their own political side actually is. Correcting false beliefs about in-group norms can increase curiosity and openness toward opposing views. Listening with genuine curiosity reduces conflict even when agreement or persuasion do not occur. Political life shows rising interparty animus and dehumanization, with partisans preferring distance to dialogue and moral judgment to intellectual engagement. Tribal psychology sorts opponents into moral categories and cognitive distortions such as confirmation bias, the bandwagon effect, and in-group bias reduce willingness and capacity to engage with conflicting ideas.

Read at Psychology Today