Lies about Migrants and the Rise of the Extreme Right

… Forged in the furnaces of hot cognition and tribal epistemology, hardened opinion dominates cool, fact-based knowledge and provides fertile ground for the spread of falsehoods through social sharing. People in general are biased toward confirmation: they wish to believe that which endorses what they already believe to be true, and they share information that confirms their values, beliefs, and passions. Information is shared, not just to inform or even to persuade but as a marker of one’s identity and a way to proclaim one’s affinity with a particular community.

Liberal communities are also guilty of confirmation bias, but their members often cling to the practice of reasoned debate to hone, strengthen, and change positions through amassing evidence. Members of tribal communities, however, act first on “hot cognition” and “tribal epistemology,” and then tend to double down on their convictions especially after being presented with contradictory evidence, which causes an uncomfortable feeling of cognitive dissonance. “Doubling down” helps resolve the feeling by dismissing the evidence. When “hot cognition” dominates thought, sharing opinions further hardens them and makes them impervious to facts. Several studies suggest that conservatives more strongly avoid dissonance-arousing information about politics and religion than liberals, who assimilate that information more readily into their views. CONT.

Beverly Crawford, Berkeley