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Tuesday
Oct032017

Nano-size examination of misinformation & identity protective reasoning

Another invited conference paper, this short, 1700-word version of "Misconceptions, Misinformation, and the Logic of Identity-Protective Cognition" (3000 words) is perfect for those readers in your family who are on a constrained "time budget" . . .

From left to right: "Misconceptions, Misinformation, and the Logic of Identity-Protective Cognition"; "Misinformation and Identity-protective Cognition"; Flynn, D.J., Nyhan, B. & Reifler, J. The Nature and Origins of Misperceptions: Understanding False and Unsupported Beliefs About Politics. Advances in Political Psychology 38, 127-150 (2017).

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Reader Comments (12)

link drop:
https://qz.com/1069298/the-3-of-scientific-papers-that-deny-climate-change-are-all-flawed/

October 3, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterJonathan

"Climate activists think climate sceptic papers are wrong" shock! :-)

October 3, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterNiV

another article citing Dan:
https://theconversation.com/why-people-around-the-world-fear-climate-change-more-than-americans-do-82630

October 3, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterJonathan

video science communication about climate change from UConn grad students:
https://phys.org/news/2017-10-social-media-climate.html

October 4, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterJonathan

For Dan:
http://philosophyofbrains.com/2017/10/02/should-we-redefine-statistical-significance-a-brains-blog-roundtable.aspx

October 4, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterJonathan

Hmmm.

On issues that provoke identity-protective cognition, the members of the public most adept at avoiding misconceptions of science are nevertheless the most culturally polarized.

How do we know who is "adept" at something except by observing the extent to which they demonstrate that ability in context? Seems to me that the description above may reflect a kind of chauvinism, whereby people deemed to be more effective at a largely decontextualized set of cognitive tasks, by a necessarily limited set of metrics (of, IMO, dubious validity), are elevated by virtue of having attributes that are more in line with how the observer sees him or herself.

I think that maybe those who are most adept at avoiding misconceptions of science are those who demonstrate such the habit of avoiding those misconceptions. But even more to the point, that maybe those who are most "adept" at avoiding polarization (with an accompanying set of misconceptions) are those who are most adept at avoiding polarization. How does it make sense to assume an "adeptness" at something which lies in contrast to how that persons manifests that "something?"

To bounce off a comment I wrote downstairs...it seems to me that those who are most "adept" at avoiding polarization on scientific issues are those who are most thorough in employing basic tools of accurate "perspective taking," which in turn largely reflects an explicit intent to employ tools that mitigate the influences of motivated reasoning and cultural cognition and identity-protective cognition.

Such an explicit intent may largely function completely independently of a (IMO, somewhat arbitrarily determined) set of cognitive attributes. And I don't really see any particular reason why that might be surprising. Someone who might score highly on some particular cognitive assessment (relative to others) and who is highly "motivated" to defend their ideological orientation, and who doesn't diligently and explicitly focus on employing tools to mitigate against those potential biases, it seems to me, should be expected to lean more towards polarization than someone who scores relatively lower on those assessments but is either less "motivated" towards MR, or CC, or IPC, or who is more diligent and explicit in their focus to employ tools to mitigate their effects.

October 5, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterJoshua

One more thought:

On issues that provoke identity-protective cognition, the members of the public most adept at avoiding misconceptions of science are nevertheless the most culturally polarized.

Bouncing off my earlier comment, isn't that somewhat like a "deficit model" applied to cultural polarization on scientific topics?

October 5, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterJoshua

link drop:
https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-1-154-climate-science-results-and-found-no-evidence-of-publication-bias-84500

October 6, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterJonathan

And here's a claasic, and beautifully ironic twist on the intersect between snowflakiness and rightwingerism:


https://www.google.com/amp/thehill.com/homenews/media/306106-breitbart-news-planning-lawsuit-against-major-media-company%3Famp

Relatedly, an interesting window into Milo's fear-mongering and exploitation of "snowflakes" and free speech, a to advance identity-oriented defense and aggression :

https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/heres-how-breitbart-and-milo-smuggled-white-nationalism?utm_term=.khPGvAy8r#.fqNvXMban

https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/heres-how-breitbart-and-milo-smuggled-white-nationalism?utm_term=.khPGvAy8r#.fqNvXMban

October 6, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterJoshua

Dan -

Oops. Could you delete that last comment - I posted it in the wrong thread.

October 6, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterJoshua

Jonathan,

"https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-1-154-climate-science-results-and-found-no-evidence-of-publication-bias-84500"

So what's their explanation between the percentage of climate scientists who believe, and the percentage of papers published expressing belief?

October 7, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterNiV

Sorry, that should be "So what's their explanation for the difference between the percentage of climate scientists who believe, and the percentage of papers published expressing belief?"

October 7, 2017 | Unregistered CommenterNiV
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