Journal
PLOS ONE
Volume 8, Issue 11, Pages -Publisher
PUBLIC LIBRARY SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0074516
Keywords
-
Categories
Funding
- Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research, NWO (VIDI) [452-04-351]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Explanations of opinion bi-polarization hinge on the assumption of negative influence, individuals' striving to amplify differences to disliked others. However, empirical evidence for negative influence is inconclusive, which motivated us to search for an alternative explanation. Here, we demonstrate that bi-polarization can be explained without negative influence, drawing on theories that emphasize the communication of arguments as central mechanism of influence. Due to homophily, actors interact mainly with others whose arguments will intensify existing tendencies for or against the issue at stake. We develop an agent-based model of this theory and compare its implications to those of existing social-influence models, deriving testable hypotheses about the conditions of bi-polarization. Hypotheses were tested with a group-discussion experiment (N = 96). Results demonstrate that argument exchange can entail bi-polarization even when there is no negative influence.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available