Understanding the Mechanisms for Disengagement from Contentious Political Interaction

这个项目的目的是为了更好地理解关于政治的社会互动的哪些方面是最容易引起压力的，对哪类人来说，在什么环境下。研究的第一部分使用调查实验来评估人际政治互动中可能引起压力的假设方面，涉及形成和表达意见的要求，以及对政治互动潜在的负面评价或社会影响的担忧。这个调查实验将在一个具有全国代表性的美国成年人样本中进行。研究的第二部分将使用一组实验室实验来证明与政治社会接触的经历与自我报告以及生理测量的压力和情绪反应之间的因果关系。通过操纵政治互动中讨论者的社会联系强度、互动形式和预期的分歧程度，该研究将更充分地阐明导致人们在政治互动中感到不舒服的机制，从而可能导致他们脱离政治。本研究将通过统一与这些主题松散相关的零散发现来填补政治学文献中的主要空白。这种独特的方法也通过严重依赖社会心理学对政治行为的解释，继续弥合政治学和心理学之间的方法论差距。由于互联网和社交媒体的发展，在一个更加两极化的政治环境中，关于政治的社会互动增加的综合影响表明，人们更有可能遇到极端的观点，在他们的社会关系中有关于政治信仰的信息，并要求表达自己的政治观点。然而，并不是每个人都会受到政治环境变化的同等影响，个体心理差异可能会影响人们如何解释有关政治的有争议的社会互动的要求和后果。这项研究考察了影响我们参与政治辩论意愿的心理特征。民主行为的基础是所有公民都有平等的机会表达自己的意见。基于性别、种族、阶级和教育水平的参与和代表障碍持续存在，并且仍然是巨大的挑战。然而，我们不应该忽视更微妙的——也许更复杂的——基于人们对冲突和分歧的倾向的接触障碍。在两极分化的环境中，喜欢达成共识和妥协的人可能会被阻止有意义地参与政治。确定政治中给公民带来压力的方面，确定政治中给公民带来压力的方面，并确定改善这种压力的方法，有可能激励和解放那些被我们当前的政治制度所挫败的公民。

The goal of this project is to better understand which facets of social interaction about politics are most stress inducing, for which kinds of people, and in which contexts. The first part of the study uses survey experiments to assess hypothesized aspects of interpersonal political interaction that may induce stress, relating to demands to form and express opinions, as well as concerns about potentially negative evaluations or social implications of political interaction. This survey experiment will be conducted with a a nationally representative sample of American adults. The second part of the study will use a set of laboratory experiments to demonstrate causal relationships between the experience of social encounters with politics and self-reported as well as physiologically-measured stress and emotional reponese. By manipulating the social tie strength of the discussants in a political interaction, the format of the interaction, and the anticipated level of disagreement, the study will more fully elucidate the mechanisms that cause people to be uncomfortable interacting about politics, potentially leading to their disengagement from politics. This research will fill major gaps in the political science literature by unifying fragemented findings loosely related to these topics. This unique approach also continues to bridge the methodological gap between between political science and psychology by relying heavily on a social psychological explanation for political behavior. The combined effect of increased social interaction about politics-due to largely to the development fo the Internet and social media-in a more polarized political environment suggest that people are more likely to encounter extreme views, information about political beliefs in their social connections, and demands to voice their own political opinions. Not everyone will be equally affected by these changes in the political environment, however, and individual psychological differences may influence how people interpret the demands and ramifications of contentious social interactions about politics. This study examines the psychological traits that impact our willingness to engage in political debate.Democratic behavior hinges on the idea that all citizens have equal opportunity to voice their opinions. Barriers to participation and representation-based on gender, race, class, and education level-persist and remain formidable challenges. However, we should not overlook more-subtle-and perhaps more complex-barriers to engagement based on people's orientation twoard conflict and disagreement. People who prefer consensus and cmpromise may be discouraged from engaging meaningfully with politics in a polarized environment. Identifying the facets of politics that are stressful to citizens, and indentifying the facets of politics that are stressful to citizens, and indentifying ways to ameliorate that stress, has the potential to energize and enfranchise citizens who are discuouraged by our current political system.