About renegades and outgroup-haters: Modelling the link between social influence and intergroup attitudes

Polarization between groups is a major topic of contemporary societal debate as well as of research into intergroup relations. Formal modelers of opinion dynamics try to explain how intergroup polarization can arise from simple first principles of interactions within and between groups. Models have been proposed in which intergroup attitudes affect social influence in the form of homophily or xenophobia, elaborated as fixed tendencies of individuals to interact more with in-group members, be more open to influence from in-group members and perhaps even distance oneself from attitudes of outgroup members. While these models can generate polarization between groups, their underlying assumptions curiously neglect a central insight from research on intergroup attitudes. Intergroup attitudes are themselves subject to social influence in interactions with both in- and outgroup members. I extend an existing model of opinion formation with intergroup attitudes, by adding this feedback-effect. I show how this changes model predictions about the process and the conditions of polarization between groups. In particular, it is demonstrated how the model implies that intergroup polarization can become less likely if intergroup attitudes change under social influence; and how more complex patterns of intergroup relations emerge. Especially, a renegade minority (outgroup-lovers) can have a key role in avoiding mutually negative intergroup relations and even elicit attitude reversal, resulting in a majority of individuals developing a negative attitude towards their in-group and a positive one of the outgroup. Interpretations of these theoretical results and directions for future research are further discussed.Comment: 33 pages, 21 figures, Paper presented at ODCD 2017. Interdisciplinary Workshop on Opinion Dynamics and Collective Decision 2017, July 5-7, 2017 @ Jacobs University Bremen, German

How to get the timing right. A computational model of the effects of the timing of contacts on team cohesion in demographically diverse teams

Lau and Murnighan’s faultline theory explains negative effects of demographic diversity on team performance as consequence of strong demographic faultlines. If demographic differences between group members are correlated across various dimensions, the team is likely to show a “subgroup split” that inhibits communication and effective collaboration between team members. Our paper proposes a rigorous formal and computational reconstruction of the theory. Our model integrates four elementary mechanisms of social interaction, homophily, heterophobia, social influence and rejection into a computational representation of the dynamics of both opinions and social relations in the team. Computational experiments demonstrate that the central claims of faultline theory are consistent with the model.We show furthermore that the model highlights a new structural condition that may give managers a handle to temper the negative effects of strong demographic faultlines. We call this condition the timing of contacts. Computational analyses reveal that negative effects of strong faultlines critically depend on who is when brought in contact with whom in the process of social interactions in the team. More specifically, we demonstrate that faultlines have hardly negative effects when teams are initially split into demographically homogeneous subteams that are merged only when a local consensus has developed.

Ethnic segregation and spatial patterns of attitudes:studying the link using register data and social simulation

We theorize the causal link between ethnic residential segregation and polarization of ethnic attitudes within and between ethnic groups (e.g. attitudes towards immigration policies, multiculturalism, tolerance or trust in certain ethnic groups). We propose that the complex relationship between segregation and polarization might be explained by three assumptions: (1) ethnic membership moderates social influence–residents influence each other’s attitudes and their ethnic background moderates this influence; (2) spatial proximity between residents increases opportunities for influence; (3) the degree of ethnic segregation varies across space–and therefore, the mix of intra- and inter-ethnic influence also varies across space. We borrow and extend an (agent-based) simulation model of social influence to systematically explore how these three assumptions affect the polarization of ethnic attitudes within and between ethnic groups under the assumptions made in the model. We simulate neighborly interactions and social influence dynamics in the districts of Rotterdam, using empirically observed segregation patterns as input of our simulations. According to our model, polarization in ethnic attitudes is stronger in districts and parts of districts where mixing of ethnic groups allows for many opportunities to interact with both the ethnic ingroup and the outgroup. Our study provides a new theoretical perspective on polarization of ethnic attitudes by demonstrating that the segregation-polarization link can emerge as an unintended outcome from repeated intra- and inter-ethnic interactions in segregated spaces.</p

Ethnic segregation and spatial patterns of attitudes:studying the link using register data and social simulation

We theorize the causal link between ethnic residential segregation and polarization of ethnic attitudes within and between ethnic groups (e.g. attitudes towards immigration policies, multiculturalism, tolerance or trust in certain ethnic groups). We propose that the complex relationship between segregation and polarization might be explained by three assumptions: (1) ethnic membership moderates social influence–residents influence each other’s attitudes and their ethnic background moderates this influence; (2) spatial proximity between residents increases opportunities for influence; (3) the degree of ethnic segregation varies across space–and therefore, the mix of intra- and inter-ethnic influence also varies across space. We borrow and extend an (agent-based) simulation model of social influence to systematically explore how these three assumptions affect the polarization of ethnic attitudes within and between ethnic groups under the assumptions made in the model. We simulate neighborly interactions and social influence dynamics in the districts of Rotterdam, using empirically observed segregation patterns as input of our simulations. According to our model, polarization in ethnic attitudes is stronger in districts and parts of districts where mixing of ethnic groups allows for many opportunities to interact with both the ethnic ingroup and the outgroup. Our study provides a new theoretical perspective on polarization of ethnic attitudes by demonstrating that the segregation-polarization link can emerge as an unintended outcome from repeated intra- and inter-ethnic interactions in segregated spaces.</p