Day 1228: Leaf Van Boven talk
Aug. 1st, 2023 11:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eve_primeToday I attended a talk by Leaf Van Boven - he's a psychology professor at the Univ. of Colorado.
Title: As the World Burns: Psychological Barriers to Addressing Climate Change and Covid-19—And How to Overcome Them
Abstract: Addressing the most pressing issues of our time, from climate change to Covid-19, requires enacting effective public policies. What are the psychological barriers to broad public support for such policies? What do these barriers tell us about how the social mind works? Our work suggests that liberals and conservatives disagree about effective policy solutions mainly for disagreement’s sake. Liberals and conservatives support climate and Covid-19 policies when political leaders from their party support them more than the same policies proposed by political leaders from the opposing political party. Such arbitrary partisanship is multiply determined. In part, people expect their partisan peers to toe the party line and they follow these partisan norms. Partisans also dislike and distrust members of the opposing political party, which undermines support for proposals from opposing parties. Although daunting, an appreciation of psychological barriers suggests strategies to overcome them. For example, policies proposed by trusted experts and bipartisan coalitions prevent polarization. Learning about widespread bipartisan support from ordinary people increases people’s policy support. And highlighting people’s values regarding good citizenship reduces political polarization. These findings illustrate how psychological scientists can help solve daunting societal challenges.
He didn't really say much more than that, except with numbers and bar charts and citations and such, but it was still interesting. It was a small group - maybe five ORI scientists, at least two Psych Dept. professors including my friend Sara, a law professor named Erik, various international scholars who are here for a week of activities, and probably a few grad students. I got to sit with my new colleague SS and chatted a while before the talk. Afterwards, many of us went over to the pizza place in the student union, which was reserved for our group, and we got free pizza. I didn't do great at networking but I did better than my other two ORI colleagues who were there, as they only talked with the law professor, whom one of them already knew, and I talked with all of them, the law professor, the guest speaker, and Sara.
Title: As the World Burns: Psychological Barriers to Addressing Climate Change and Covid-19—And How to Overcome Them
Abstract: Addressing the most pressing issues of our time, from climate change to Covid-19, requires enacting effective public policies. What are the psychological barriers to broad public support for such policies? What do these barriers tell us about how the social mind works? Our work suggests that liberals and conservatives disagree about effective policy solutions mainly for disagreement’s sake. Liberals and conservatives support climate and Covid-19 policies when political leaders from their party support them more than the same policies proposed by political leaders from the opposing political party. Such arbitrary partisanship is multiply determined. In part, people expect their partisan peers to toe the party line and they follow these partisan norms. Partisans also dislike and distrust members of the opposing political party, which undermines support for proposals from opposing parties. Although daunting, an appreciation of psychological barriers suggests strategies to overcome them. For example, policies proposed by trusted experts and bipartisan coalitions prevent polarization. Learning about widespread bipartisan support from ordinary people increases people’s policy support. And highlighting people’s values regarding good citizenship reduces political polarization. These findings illustrate how psychological scientists can help solve daunting societal challenges.
He didn't really say much more than that, except with numbers and bar charts and citations and such, but it was still interesting. It was a small group - maybe five ORI scientists, at least two Psych Dept. professors including my friend Sara, a law professor named Erik, various international scholars who are here for a week of activities, and probably a few grad students. I got to sit with my new colleague SS and chatted a while before the talk. Afterwards, many of us went over to the pizza place in the student union, which was reserved for our group, and we got free pizza. I didn't do great at networking but I did better than my other two ORI colleagues who were there, as they only talked with the law professor, whom one of them already knew, and I talked with all of them, the law professor, the guest speaker, and Sara.
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Date: 2023-08-03 01:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-08-04 10:00 am (UTC)