KEY #12: Today's the day we talk about The Key
This newsletter originated in research I did for a neuroscience class, on the question: How do people change their minds? And this week we've talked about some of the (many) ways we resist changing our minds. It's a very uncomfortable experience.
But wait! I have good news! Sometimes we do change our minds — and sometimes we change other people's minds.
• A crack in Fortress Me
Researchers in Israel and Bosnia tried an experiment to see under what conditions people there would recognize their own group's responsibility for violence toward another group. This is a hard barrier to break, because people naturally argue for their own group's side (see "motivated reasoning" in The Key #6) and they have their shields up because it's about their identity.
So they tried two ways of preparing the participants before asking them about their own group's responsibility.
1. They had some begin by writing a short essay about a positive personal accomplishment of their own, and then asked them about in-group responsibility. Participants who started with a personal affirmation were more likely to agree with their own group's responsibility than those who had not.
2. They had other subjects begin by writing about a positive characteristic of their in-group. Afterwards, these people were not more likely to accept in-group responsibility, and were possibly more likely to defend their in-group.
That's interesting. What it suggests is that people (some of them) were capable of changing their minds if they were made to feel less threatened. However, if they were made to identify with their group, they would be more group-conscious and stick with the group's side.
Takeaway: Make people feel non-threatened by your approach.
They feel threatened if their identity is threatened. They feel open to change if their identity is not threatened. Now we can start to talk about what I've been referring to as "The Key."
• People have a trick they can do
On November 22, 2013, I took this picture:
It was the 50th anniversary of the JFK assassination, and all of the media were commemorating Kennedy.
This presented quite a dilemma for Fox News! How do you commemorate the iconic Democratic president?
As you can see, they recast the whole issue: "JFK would be a 'conservative' today." Then it became very easy to celebrate JFK. Why? Because they didn't have to change themselves to do it.
We've talked about how opinions don't exist on some higher plane of reason — they grow out of your identity. That's why it's very emotional to confront information that conflicts with your opinion — because you experience it as an attack on your deep self.
So people have a trick they can do: They say, I haven't changed. I can reconsider my belief — if I don't have to change who I am.
Takeaway: People can change their minds if they can keep their own identity.
In the coming days we'll look at real-life examples and how to make this part of your communications.
• Okay, so how does this help me?
In 2018, while canvassing in Pennsylvania, I was failing to follow my own advice. I got into a conversation with a man whose immediate question was: What is the candidate's position on abortion? I said she was pro-choice and he handed back the literature and said, "That's all I need to know. I'm a Christian." (Note that he gave me his identity as the reason for his opinion, just like we've been talking about.) And he spent a good while telling me how bad abortion is, and I tried to find some openings for discussion in his argument but there were none.
That was dumb! There was no point arguing with his opinion about abortion, or even prolonging that conversation. The longer he defended it, the more our interaction became rooted in this argument.
So finally, I changed the subject and asked him to tell me about the neighborhood, and he said it used to be bad but it's getting better. We talked about that for a while. I made no progress with him, having let the conversation get off on the wrong foot — as a confrontation involving his most core value — but what I should have done from the beginning is the following.
Start with something the person can talk about positively, even if it's "Those are such beautiful kids. How old are they? How are they doing? How are the schools?"
If you can, get to some other subject that you might have common ground on. Social Security and Medicare is a big one. People really want to talk about that, and Republicans are perennially working to cut it. That becomes a reason for them to think twice.
Start from the person's own sense of positivity about himself, or his own daily experiences, not arguments against what the person thinks.
Joshua Tanzer
jmtanzer@gmail.com
Los Angeles
Takeaway Toteboard
- KEY #1: Republicans are from Mars, Democrats are from Swarthmore. (Feb. 23):
• Democrats run an intellectual campaign to voters who are emotional creatures.
• Instead of running an intellectual campaign, we need to use our intellect to create an emotional campaign.
- KEY #2: What does the Democrats’ hat say? (Feb. 26)
• The Republicans’ philosophy fits on a hat. Democrats don’t have one.
- KEY #3: Love isn’t rational. (Feb 28):
• Politics is emotion.
• If you find yourself trying to argue intellectually, stop! Find the emotional argument.
- KEY #4: You’re an animal! (March 1):
• Our attitudes come from our identity.
• You are speaking to the voter's animal brain.
- KEY #5: Don’t take away my _____! (March 4):
• Don't get into a fight with people's way of life.
• When you talk about change, find the “win.”
- KEY #6: You are this boy and life is this marshmallow. (March 6):
• Find ways to affirm people's way of life.
• Don’t just campaign; build community.
- KEY #7: Motivated reasoning (aka “Remember this friggin guy?”) (March 8):
• People believe what they need to believe.
- KEY #8: How your head keeps from exploding (March 11):
• People experiencing cognitive dissonance want an alternative narrative to make it better.
• Do not engage with your opponent’s alternative narrative.
- KEY #9: Lalalalalalalala, I'm not listening! (March 13):
• People don't hear information that conflicts with their opinions.
• Misinformation stays in people's heads. (And trying to correct it doesn't work well.)
• Don't respond to attacks by repeating the same attacks in your own language.
- KEY #10: Maybe there’s hope for people (March 15):
• Get out ahead of charges with your own framing.
• Correct misinformation fast.
• Let people know when they're about to hear something untrue.
• Undermine the source.
• Reframe, don’t repeat.
- KEY #11: The first rule of debate club is … (March 18):
• Arguing with people doesn't change their minds.
- KEY #12: Today’s the day we talk about The Key (March 20):
• Make people feel non-threatened by your approach.
• People can change their minds if they can keep their own identity.