Discrepancy, Disliking and Negative Opinion Shifts

Takács, Károly and Flache, Andreas and Mäs, Michael (2016) Discrepancy, Disliking and Negative Opinion Shifts. [Data Collection]

Abstract

Both classical social psychological theories and recent formal models of opinion differentiation and bi-polarization assign a prominent role to negative social influence. Negative influence is defined as shifts away from the opinion of others and hypothesized to be induced by discrepancy with or disliking of the source of influence. There is strong empirical support for the presence of positive social influence (a shift towards the opinion of others), but evidence that large opinion differences or disliking could trigger negative shifts is mixed. We examine positive and negative influence with controlled exposure to opinions of other individuals in one experiment and with opinion exchange in another study. Results confirm that similarities induce attraction, but results do not support that discrepancy or disliking entails negative influence. Instead, our findings suggest a robust positive linear relationship between opinion distance and opinion shifts.

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Title in English: Discrepancy, Disliking and Negative Opinion Shifts
Keywords: negatív társadalmi befolyás, véleménydinamika, vonzerő, idegenkedés, különbözőség, eltérés, nem szeret
Keywords in English: negative social influence, opinion dynamics, attraction, repulsion, dissimilarity, discrepancy, disliking
Subjects: H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General)
H Social Sciences > HN Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform
H Social Sciences > HT Communities. Classes. Races
Divisions: Institute for Sociology
Research funder: NWO (AF, VIDI Grant 452-04-351)
Depositing User: Judit Gárdos
Date Deposited: 03 Nov 2016 10:29
Last Modified: 09 Apr 2019 12:56
URI: https://openarchive.tk.mta.hu/id/eprint/375

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