[politics] trying to remember the name of a psychological phenomenon

[kaberett]

Observation from this general election just gone: there were an awful lot of Lib Dem members insisting that Labour was awful forever because of things the party did ten years ago under Blair; there were a lot of Labour members insisting the Lib Dems were awful and untrustworthy forever because of things they did back in 2010 going into coalition[1]; and I know at least some Conservative voters airily certain that the shit going down with that party at the moment is a temporary blip and Common Sense Will Prevail.

Something each of these positions requires is hewing to a model based on a Strong And Probably Emotional Impression & utterly failing to update it in light of context/new data/etc. There's a term for this, right?

(Because maybe given the term I can go do the reading on how we overcome this cognitive bias.)

[1] tl;dr in order to understand How Shit Might Go Wrong In Future you gotta understand past motivations, and "overriding goal of getting PR meets incompetence at running campaigns" explains an awful lot of LD decisions

Comments

[booksarelife]

I’m pretty sure there is a term but I have no idea what it might be, unfortunately (though my brain is giving me tiny unhelpful edges of thoughts)

[kaberett]

Pretty sure jedusor got what I was looking for with belief perseverance!

[vass]

Argh. I too am certain there's a term but can't remember what it is.

[kaberett]

jedusor came up with "belief perseverance", which I think is pretty much exactly what I was going for! In case you didn't see and would like this to stop itching. <3

[vass]

THANK YOU. Itch relieved.

That reminds me of... Did you ever read that article about that one study of pro-choice and pro-life (cis) women? I can't remember where I read it, or when, but: someone put together two groups of women, one strongly pro-choice, the other strongly pro-life. So they had very strongly opposing views of the "you kill babies" and "you kill women" variety. The researchers held discussion sessions where the two groups sat down together and talked about their beliefs, and then evaluated each woman for how her views about abortion and her views about the women in the other group had changed over time.

They kept meeting up for a long time, I want to say after the study was meant to conclude? Voluntarily?

Anyway, there were two findings:
1. They came to like and care about each other over that time. (I don't know how many dropped out because they couldn't, or didn't feel safe, etc. Or what the demographics were and if that made a difference.) The friendships became quite close and enduring.
2. Their views didn't change. None of them changed their minds in either direction.
3. In fact, their views became more entrenched.

[staranise]

A rabbit hole I just got lost in: the wiki page List of cognitive biases. The biggest basket this would go in is, I think, confirmation bias.

Hilariously, what sounds most apt is literally just called Conservatism: "the tendency to revise one's belief insufficiently when presented with new evidence"

[kaberett]

(1) I did an indelicate laugh-groan at "conservatism", and (2) I think a more specific basket is belief perseverance, which jedusor dug out for me! :D

(I got started on the list of cognitive biases, and got as far as anchoring before deciding I should go to bed and just let the internet answer the question for me while I slept.)

[wildeabandon]

Is 'tribalism' the term you're looking for? It's not a perfect fit, but quite close, I think.

[kaberett]

I think jedusor and staranise got what I was looking for with "belief perseverance" and "conservatism" (... lolsob) respectively! Which gives me more to dig into.

I tend to try to avoid tribalism & similar because I am Dubious about the connotations/implications (I have concerns about the beliefs the usage is drawing on all these reasons, to pick a summary), but I thank you for the prompt!

[jedusor]

belief perseverance! (I mean, there's a lot going on there psychologically, but I suspect this is the term you're grasping for.)

[kaberett]

I think that is exactly what I was looking for -- thank you <3

[jedusor]

well hey, that stupidly expensive psych degree comes in handy once in a while XD

[kaberett]

Yep! :D

[silveradept]

If it isn't that directly, it sounds like something related to confirmation bias, possibly with risk avoidance and catastrophization thrown in to compensate.

[kaberett]

Confirmation bias was a thing I was considering but which didn't quite fit what I was getting at; I think jedusor hit the target with "belief perseverance"!

[damerell]

I don't really think of the Coalition as that long ago - it ended only 4 years ago - and I'm not sure "LDs form government with Tories in order to secure a referendum they then lose because the Tories do their best to scupper it" was an entirely implausible scenario in 2019...

[kaberett]

I agree (and I didn't until toward the end of the campaign, ugh, but apparently I don't much care for Jo Swinson as leader and am appalled at how badly internal party structure has been working or... not, as the case may be, in despite of my preexisting disillusionment) but I also think that "Yellow Tories" is an unhelpful framing, particularly in Tory-LD marginals (which do still exist).

Basically.

(Plusand: there has been so much change in internal party structure and in makeup of the Parliamentary party that I do think there are significant discontinuities with the party that was in coalition government.)

My impression (from viewing a lot of these conversations) is that LD motivations for going into coalition (securing a referendum; demonstrating that coalition governments could be functional and get shit done) get elided into "just desperate for power" in a way that I don't consider accurate, which to my mind is significant & important because it's relevant to predicting how they'll fuck up in future.

And, I mean, they are still less bad than the bloody Tories.

[damerell]

TBH, I thought a slightly less pejorative formulation of "yellow Tory" was going to be ideal in terms of getting Tory Remainers to vote for the LDs, which was what was really needed to not lose the election, but apparently I was entirely wrong about that because it certainly didn't work.

I certainly don't think of the 2010 LDs as "just desperate for power" but - perhaps with the benefit of the sort of hindsight where one retrospectively remembers being right all along - naive, in the "never trust a Tory" way.