Victimization Triggers Spontaneous Side-Taking in Narratives

IGEL2022
#1

:speech_balloon: Speaker : Claire Woodward

:classical_building: Affiliation : Department of Germanic Studies, Indiana University

Title : Victimization Triggers Spontaneous Side-Taking in Narratives

Abstract : We study the effects of side-taking in narratives and find that when people spontaneously take a side for a victim, they do not remember the perpetrator well, assume the victim is the narrator of events, and judge the victim as more relatable and understandable. In ongoing narratives with escalations of violence between two characters, people remain highly committed to one side when they receive sympathetic background information about that particular character, but fail to maintain commitment without priming information. Our findings demonstrate how perceived disadvantages and victimization triggers side-taking in narratives and can potentially lead to ongoing polarization.

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:newspaper: Long abstract

Victim narratives act as powerful motivators for spontaneous side-taking. In a wide range of cases people take sides spontaneously where they have no previous commitment to either side. We call this phenomenon spontaneous side-taking (SST) and suggest SST can occur when people observe a disagreement or conflict. In this paper, we explore how SST unfolds in narratives. While SST may lead to intervention in real world situations, we argue SST also occurs when no direct intervention is possible, such as in observing films, fiction, legal trials, sports, and debates. We propose that SST, though quick, can lead to long-term side-taking in the form of choice reinforcement, polarization, and coalition formation. These phenomena can then lead people to assume identities that serve to orient actions in social conflicts. To examine SST in narratives within the context of previous scholarship, we concentrate on three theories to narrative thinking: the Dyad Model by Wegner and Gray (2011, 2016), the Bystander Coordination Model by DeScioli and Kurzban (2009, 2013), and the Three-Person Model of Empathy by Breithaupt (2012, 2019).

We designed two studies to help us explore how SST functions specifically in narratives. In both studies, participants read stories with two characters and are interrupted after each paragraph to respond to questions about the characters regarding side-taking preferences and associated confidence in their choices. In Study 1, the story presents a three-paragraph story with two characters that are first engaged in friendly interaction, until one morally harms the other. In Study 2, a five-paragraph story presents an ongoing conflict between two characters in which each character takes on the roles of both perpetrator and victim in each paragraph. Participants were collected through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, with a total of 127 participants for Study 1 and 322 for Study 2. Sample size was determined before any data analysis.

We find that when people spontaneously take a side for a victim, they do not remember the perpetrator well, assume the victim is the narrator of events, and judge the victim as more relatable and understandable. In ongoing narratives with escalations of violence between two characters, people remain highly committed to one side when they receive sympathetic background information about that particular character, but fail to maintain commitment without priming information. Our findings demonstrate how perceived disadvantages and victimization triggers side-taking in narratives and can potentially lead to ongoing polarization. Overall, our findings most support the Dyad Model and Three-Person Model.

We show that victimization triggers SST and leads to better memory of the victim. When
SST is maintained and prolonged over time, people have higher confidence in their choice than
when they previously switched sides. Our study has implications for an increasingly polarized
society, where many people believe they have the “right side.” Framing stories around victimhood leads to SST and may make SST more salient. While one may hope that SST trains flexibility of the mind not only to choose a side quickly in a conflict but also escape entrenched polarization by imagining other’s perspectives, our studies suggest that SST may stick and thus result in cemented side-taking and polarization. It seems that SST is connected to people’s unwillingness to give voice to the other side of an issue or conflict, demonstrated by current conversations about “cancel culture” and “safety-ism” strengthened by echo chamber effects in media consumption. Side-taking then becomes a side effect of existing within an echo chamber.

Similarly, our studies indicate that people are influenced by details outside of the current conflict.
The influence of the irrelevant but sympathetic background information in Study 2 and the
connection between side-taking and relatability in Study 1 indicate that side-taking may be largely based on relatability and emotion, not necessarily who most deserves support.

IGEL2022 conference schedule
#2

Thanks for a very interesting talk! I look forward to learning more about this. You already said something about which character actions were relevant to your purposes, but maybe you can elaborate on that a bit more. I’d like to refer you to a talk by Julia de Jonge in this conference. Possibly the two of you have shared interests.

#3

Thank you @clamwood for your presentation; however grim the picture is you paint at the end of your presentation, I enjoyed the presentation of the research itself. I was wondering whether you know of, or have taken individual difference measures into account in your studies on SST. Would there be something like a tendency to “dig in your heels” in some people and not in others, that could explain the influence of relatability and emotion on SST? I am thinking of conspiracy theorists in the last couple of years on Twitter (or actually Twitter in general in the last couple of years has at times developed into polarized debates, just for the sake of debating); I am not sure whether this is a general societal trend, or whether there are individual differences that can account for some of it, but I would be interested in hearing your ideas about this. Thank you!

#4

Thank you, I watched Julia de Jonge’s presentation and had a similar impression about the overlap of our projects.
We looked at the aggressive characters’ actions in the narratives. In the first study, these actions were something like pushing down a coworker into a pile of boxes or pouring coffee on a neighbor’s sweater. These things happened only once. In the second study, there was a series of escalating aggressions from both characters. Examples of such actions were name calling, pranking, physical assault, and property damage. I am happy to go into more detail if that didn’t quite answer your question!

1 Like
#5

Thanks for the comment and question! This is very pertinent to how ideas spread across social media. Unfortunately our study doesn’t provide us with details about individual differences, though it seems highly plausible those exist. Our second study shows a general pattern of people digging in their heels a bit once they’ve made a choice, and being more confident about doing so. This might translate into these people being “louder” on Twitter as well. If someone is initially convinced they are on the right side, it is cognitively more difficult to switch sides (and do so confidently). Although I am not familiar with research done on how individual differences might account for differences in SST, it is something I will look into and continue to think about!

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#6

Thank you for the nice experiment, @clamwood ! I’m very curious about how the priming in study 2 was like. If the participants realized that they were being primed, perhaps they would stick to the primed character for social desirability? Or, even if they changed sides, maybe a certain social desirability component regarding their relationship with the researchers conducting the experiment remains.

Furthermore, there was a certain, not irrelevant number of people who did change sides, which challenges the tendency to just stick to one’s initial side. What is most commonly described as polarisation is precisely the will to stick to one’s side despite everything, this antagonistic refusal to agree with the other side. “Sides” are in themselves constructed, often only appearing precisely as people have to choose a side: do you believe people would be less confident in their stances if they hadn’t been asked to pick a side? How could we as scientists help finding ways to counter inflexible side-taking, and do you think this would be something desirable at all?

#7

Thanks for your questions! The priming for study 2 was a sympathetic background paragraph for either character A or B (explaining some difficult aspect in their personal life). It is very possible that participants might have realized they were being primed, though we did offer personal perspectives from each character for the rest of the story. Our participants came through Amazon Turk, so we had no existing relationship with them, though that is an important issue about the social desirability of sticking with the first character introduced!

We discussed the possibility of not letting participants choose a side, but ultimately decided we wanted to give them a forced choice and let the confidence ratings tell us how unhappy they were about this choice. We were surprised that the overall confidence ratings were so high in a forced choice (“so high”= not 0 or 1 in most cases). To me, this shows that the act of being forced to choose made people invested in their choice. I have some other statistics I can share about the “switchers” and “non-swtichers” as well that demonstrate the effect on confidence side-switching had, regardless of raw numbers (though of course yes–very important to note how many people did change sides! They just didn’t seem too happy about it.

Let me think about that last question a bit more about countering inflexible side-taking!

1 Like
#8

You probably know this publications Claire - seems relevant: Kaufman, G. F., & Libby, L. K. (2012). Changing beliefs and behavior through experience-taking. Journal of personality and social psychology, 103(1), 1. And this classic one: Bower, G. H. (1978). Experiments on story comprehension and recall. Discourse Processes, 1(3), 211-231. Oh, a note, to help you understand why I think it is relevant:relevant to your priming manipulation. Nice studies Claire!