Megastudy tests crowdsourced ideas to reduce political polarization

Show likeable characters with different beliefs, discussed over a drink. Highlight a shared identity. Correct misconceptions about opposing partisans’ views on democracy. These are some of the most effective strategies for reducing political polarization in the United States, identified by a “mega-study” that surveyed more than 32,000 Democrats and Republicans to test 25 ideas from social scientists and other experts from around the world.

Led by a new Cornell faculty member, the research highlights opportunities to ease tensions that the current election cycle could exacerbate – if effective strategies can be implemented consistently and at scale.

“Many stakeholders have a vested interest in reducing polarization and strengthening democratic attitudes in the United States,” said Jan Voelkel, postdoctoral associate and new assistant professor of public policy and sociology at the Cornell Jeb E. Brooks School of Public . Policy. “We provide insight into the type of psychological mechanisms they should trigger if they were to launch scalable interventions.”

Voelkel is the first in a series of more than 80 co-authors of a study titled “Megastudy Testing 25 Treatments to Reduction Anti-democratic Attitudes and Partisan Animosity,” published October 17 in Science. The research was conducted as part of the “Strengthening Democracy Challenge” at Stanford University, where Voelkel earned his doctorate.

Although polarization is widely studied, Voelkel said, different methods have made it difficult to compare strategies to reduce it. The new study sought to rectify this problem and, in the wake of unfounded claims of election fraud and the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, make rapid progress, putting as many ideas as possible to a test against to face. with the same sampling population, the same results and the same control conditions.

The researchers made an open call to academics and professionals (e.g., think tanks, nonprofits, journalists) for ideas on how to reduce partisan animosity and support for antidemocratic attitudes and political violence. Proposals poured in: 252 from 419 people based in 17 countries on four continents, which is indicative, Voelkel said, of the importance of American democracy to the world. An advisory committee helped select the 25 most promising submissions, the maximum allowed by funding.

Study participants were Democrats and Republicans, matching quotas consistent with high-quality samples for demographic factors such as gender, age, race, ethnicity, education, strength of partisan identification and the region. They were randomly assigned to control groups or survey treatments, which were conducted online and lasted up to eight minutes.

Regarding partisan animosity, the results were encouraging: 23 of the 25 ideas tested significantly reduced it. The strategies underlying the treatments with the greatest effects were:

• Highlight nice, likeable people with different political beliefs. The most successful example was a British Heineken ad, “Worlds Apart”, which brought together couples of strangers with different beliefs on feminism, climate change and transgender rights, showing each couple bonding and then continuing to chat over a beer.
• Promote a common multi-party identity. Effective processing suggests that most Democrats and Republicans constitute an exhausted majority, tired of polarization. According to another supporter, supporters are united by their American identity.

“We understand pretty well how to reduce the fundamental aversion to opposition supporters,” Voelkel said, “and the effects were quite large, so we thought that was great news.”

How to reduce undemocratic practices is less well understood; only six survey treatments accomplished this goal significantly. The most effective strategies were:

• Shining a light on exaggerated stereotypes about the other side. The data shows that supporters’ actual support for undemocratic practices is much less than their opponents think.
• Highlighting the importance of democracy: A treatment including video showing footage from countries where democracy has collapsed and the January 6 riots demonstrated that the United States is also vulnerable.
• Show elites endorsing democratic norms. One example is a 2020 ad, “One Nation,” in which Utah gubernatorial candidates agree to respect the outcome of the election.

“We still have a lot to learn about antidemocratic attitudes, but we have some intriguing findings we can build on,” Voelkel said. “Our research shows that it is in principle possible to reduce these concerning attitudes.”

The mega-study also suggested the importance of evaluating the effects of strategies on multiple outcomes. For example, if highlighting the threat of democratic collapse reduced support for antidemocratic attitudes among Democrats and Republicans – although it worked better for Democrats than Republicans – it also had the opposite effect . The video has increased support for political violence among more conservative Republicans, likely because they do not view January 6 as an undemocratic action.

Two weeks later, among nearly 9,000 study participants, researchers found that the depolarizing effects had significantly diminished. This suggests that even the most effective strategies should be performed often or with more intensity. Promising applications may include social media platforms adjusting their algorithms to promote common rather than extreme voices; the broader media landscape exposing people to more pro-democracy messages; and political elites promoting democratic values ​​and institutions.

“There are effective ways to reduce polarization, but we need systemic interventions to truly have a lasting impact,” Voelkel said. “Dozens of scientists collaborated on this study. We now also need large-scale collaborations to put the results into practice.”