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Resistance to Position Change, Motivated Reasoning, and Polarization

Publication ,  Journal Article
Stanley, ML; Henne, P; Yang, BW; De Brigard, F
Published in: Political Behavior
September 1, 2020

People seem more divided than ever before over social and political issues, entrenched in their existing beliefs and unwilling to change them. Empirical research on mechanisms driving this resistance to belief change has focused on a limited set of well-known, charged, contentious issues and has not accounted for deliberation over reasons and arguments in belief formation prior to experimental sessions. With a large, heterogeneous sample (N = 3001), we attempt to overcome these existing problems, and we investigate the causes and consequences of resistance to belief change for five diverse and less contentious socio-political issues. After participants chose initially to support or oppose a given socio-political position, they were provided with reasons favoring their chosen position (affirming reasons), reasons favoring the other, unchosen position (conflicting reasons), or all reasons for both positions (reasons for both sides). Our results indicate that participants are more likely to stick with their initial decisions than to change them no matter which reasons are considered, and that this resistance to belief change is likely due to a motivated, biased evaluation of the reasons to support their initial beliefs (prior-belief bias). More specifically, they rated affirming reasons more favorably than conflicting reasons—even after accounting for reported prior knowledge about the issue, the novelty of the reasons presented, and the reported strategy used to make the initial decision. In many cases, participants who did not change their positions tended to become more confident in the superiority of their positions after considering many reasons for both sides.

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Published In

Political Behavior

DOI

EISSN

1573-6687

ISSN

0190-9320

Publication Date

September 1, 2020

Volume

42

Issue

3

Start / End Page

891 / 913

Related Subject Headings

  • Political Science & Public Administration
  • 4408 Political science
  • 1606 Political Science
 

Citation

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Stanley, M. L., Henne, P., Yang, B. W., & De Brigard, F. (2020). Resistance to Position Change, Motivated Reasoning, and Polarization. Political Behavior, 42(3), 891–913. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-019-09526-z
Stanley, M. L., P. Henne, B. W. Yang, and F. De Brigard. “Resistance to Position Change, Motivated Reasoning, and Polarization.” Political Behavior 42, no. 3 (September 1, 2020): 891–913. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-019-09526-z.
Stanley ML, Henne P, Yang BW, De Brigard F. Resistance to Position Change, Motivated Reasoning, and Polarization. Political Behavior. 2020 Sep 1;42(3):891–913.
Stanley, M. L., et al. “Resistance to Position Change, Motivated Reasoning, and Polarization.” Political Behavior, vol. 42, no. 3, Sept. 2020, pp. 891–913. Scopus, doi:10.1007/s11109-019-09526-z.
Stanley ML, Henne P, Yang BW, De Brigard F. Resistance to Position Change, Motivated Reasoning, and Polarization. Political Behavior. 2020 Sep 1;42(3):891–913.
Journal cover image

Published In

Political Behavior

DOI

EISSN

1573-6687

ISSN

0190-9320

Publication Date

September 1, 2020

Volume

42

Issue

3

Start / End Page

891 / 913

Related Subject Headings

  • Political Science & Public Administration
  • 4408 Political science
  • 1606 Political Science