Periodic Reporting for period 3 - PerInterv (Personalized Interventions to Improve Intergroup Relations and Promote Peace)
Reporting period: 2023-06-01 to 2024-11-30
Recently, intergroup conflicts and hostilities have surged globally, spanning from enduring conflicts in the Middle East to tensions between EU citizens and immigrants. The escalation of state-based armed conflicts has reached unprecedented levels, highlighting the critical need to address the destructive impact of intergroup tensions. Social scientists have shifted towards interventionist approaches, aiming to provide evidence-based methods to mitigate prejudice and foster intergroup reconciliation.
While traditional interventions have focused on interaction and understanding, newer approaches explore interventions without direct contact. These target core intergroup perceptions, emotions, and social norms. This proposal integrates both prejudice reduction and peace-promoting interventions under the term "intergroup interventions". Despite significant progress, current research often applies uniform interventions without considering individual psychological differences.
Surprisingly, despite the urgency of reducing intergroup tensions and hostilities worldwide, and the new opportunities technology provides in terms of personalization of messages, there has not yet been a systematic attempt to offer first a theoretical framework, and then an empirical examination of a personalized approach to intergroup interventions.
This raises three pivotal questions: Are interventions equally effective for all individuals and contexts? Can a personalized approach enhance the effectiveness and durability of intergroup interventions? Can combining interventions tailored for specific audiences lead to improved outcomes?
The project comprises four work plans. WP1 entails a meta-analysis of existing research on interventions for intergroup relations and peace promotion. WP2 involves a large-scale intervention tournament to test various interventions matched with different personality traits. In WP3, interventions will be tested in a controlled setting, followed by real-world field studies in Israel and the EU in WP4. The ultimate goal is to develop effective personalized interventions to enhance intergroup relations and promote peace.
While traditional interventions have focused on interaction and understanding, newer approaches explore interventions without direct contact. These target core intergroup perceptions, emotions, and social norms. This proposal integrates both prejudice reduction and peace-promoting interventions under the term "intergroup interventions". Despite significant progress, current research often applies uniform interventions without considering individual psychological differences.
Surprisingly, despite the urgency of reducing intergroup tensions and hostilities worldwide, and the new opportunities technology provides in terms of personalization of messages, there has not yet been a systematic attempt to offer first a theoretical framework, and then an empirical examination of a personalized approach to intergroup interventions.
This raises three pivotal questions: Are interventions equally effective for all individuals and contexts? Can a personalized approach enhance the effectiveness and durability of intergroup interventions? Can combining interventions tailored for specific audiences lead to improved outcomes?
The project comprises four work plans. WP1 entails a meta-analysis of existing research on interventions for intergroup relations and peace promotion. WP2 involves a large-scale intervention tournament to test various interventions matched with different personality traits. In WP3, interventions will be tested in a controlled setting, followed by real-world field studies in Israel and the EU in WP4. The ultimate goal is to develop effective personalized interventions to enhance intergroup relations and promote peace.
The reporting period encompassed two main work packages (WPs):
In WP1, a collaborative effort with experts both within and beyond the research team led to the creation and pre-registration of criteria for a data-driven meta-analysis. This involved defining dependent measures of interest (support for peace) and excluding measures not aligned with the study's purpose (prejudice, trust towards the adversary, etc.). Specific violent conflict locations were integrated into search terms to effectively capture relevant literature. This was based on data from the Major Episodes of Political Violence, 1946-2018 database and the UCDP/PRIO Armed Conflict Dataset version 21.1. The literature search covered various databases and returned 12,609 records, after which 109 duplicates were removed. Additionally, a call for unpublished data yielded seven more research reports. The screening process included an initial title and abstract screening performed by trained research assistants, followed by full-text screening by members of the research team. Data from the 77 included records have been extracted, independently coded, and discrepancies resolved. Currently, the extracted data is being integrated for forthcoming analyses.
WP2 aimed to provide an initial, systematic examination of the model within an online tournament paradigm. Over the course of a year, six unique experimental interventions were developed based on initial hypotheses, meta-analyses, and field advancements. Scholars collaborated to transform the psychological mechanisms into standardized two-minute video clips. These underwent feedback screenings and the final versions, along with a control clip, were produced. Four interventions had two versions, addressing relations between different groups, resulting in ten unique experimental movie clips. These clips were designed for easy adaptation to various contexts. The final list of interventions includes those manipulating perceptions of essentialism, group and conflict malleability, paradoxical thinking, dynamic ingroup norms, self-affirmation, and correcting intergroup misperceptions. WP2 also includes a two-measurement study, where participants' personalization parameters are measured in the first study, and they are then randomly exposed to one of the six experimental conditions (or control) in the second. Given two unique intergroup contexts with different dependent variables, two intervention tournaments will be conducted, doubling the initial sample size. The initial measurements included 3,200 Jewish Israeli participants, filling a detailed questionnaire covering all relevant personalization parameters. The second stage study, aimed at assessing dependent variables, will take place a month after the first measurement.
In WP1, a collaborative effort with experts both within and beyond the research team led to the creation and pre-registration of criteria for a data-driven meta-analysis. This involved defining dependent measures of interest (support for peace) and excluding measures not aligned with the study's purpose (prejudice, trust towards the adversary, etc.). Specific violent conflict locations were integrated into search terms to effectively capture relevant literature. This was based on data from the Major Episodes of Political Violence, 1946-2018 database and the UCDP/PRIO Armed Conflict Dataset version 21.1. The literature search covered various databases and returned 12,609 records, after which 109 duplicates were removed. Additionally, a call for unpublished data yielded seven more research reports. The screening process included an initial title and abstract screening performed by trained research assistants, followed by full-text screening by members of the research team. Data from the 77 included records have been extracted, independently coded, and discrepancies resolved. Currently, the extracted data is being integrated for forthcoming analyses.
WP2 aimed to provide an initial, systematic examination of the model within an online tournament paradigm. Over the course of a year, six unique experimental interventions were developed based on initial hypotheses, meta-analyses, and field advancements. Scholars collaborated to transform the psychological mechanisms into standardized two-minute video clips. These underwent feedback screenings and the final versions, along with a control clip, were produced. Four interventions had two versions, addressing relations between different groups, resulting in ten unique experimental movie clips. These clips were designed for easy adaptation to various contexts. The final list of interventions includes those manipulating perceptions of essentialism, group and conflict malleability, paradoxical thinking, dynamic ingroup norms, self-affirmation, and correcting intergroup misperceptions. WP2 also includes a two-measurement study, where participants' personalization parameters are measured in the first study, and they are then randomly exposed to one of the six experimental conditions (or control) in the second. Given two unique intergroup contexts with different dependent variables, two intervention tournaments will be conducted, doubling the initial sample size. The initial measurements included 3,200 Jewish Israeli participants, filling a detailed questionnaire covering all relevant personalization parameters. The second stage study, aimed at assessing dependent variables, will take place a month after the first measurement.
We've recently published two experimental articles, marking early milestones in our project. The first, published in "Nature Communications" (Hasson et al. 2022), introduced a novel intervention combining psychology and art to amplify the belief in boundless empathy. Across diverse intergroup contexts, including ethnic, national, religious, and political groups, we discovered that a belief in limited empathy correlated with reduced outgroup empathy. Conversely, instilling the idea of limitless empathy amplified outgroup empathy, bolstered support for prosocial actions, and promoted more empathic behaviors in face-to-face interactions. This interdisciplinary endeavor exemplifies the potential of collaboration in tackling widespread societal challenges.
Our second publication, conducted in partnership with an Israeli NGO, examined the impact of a video-based self-affirmation intervention on support for resource redistribution between Jews and Arabs in Israel (Shuman et al., 2022). This study, published in "Group Processes and Intergroup Relations," demonstrated the effectiveness of the video intervention in garnering support for resource redistribution. This breakthrough highlights the successful translation of psychological interventions into video format, a crucial insight as we move forward in testing various interventions in this medium. Moreover, few studies have explored the effects of psychological interventions on resource redistribution, emphasizing the broader applicability of these interventions beyond prejudice reduction.
In the remaining phase of our project, we aim to conclude the intervention tournaments and subject them to various studies, aligning with our initial plan. We anticipate that our findings will offer fresh perspectives on the use of personalized interventions to enhance intergroup relations.
Our second publication, conducted in partnership with an Israeli NGO, examined the impact of a video-based self-affirmation intervention on support for resource redistribution between Jews and Arabs in Israel (Shuman et al., 2022). This study, published in "Group Processes and Intergroup Relations," demonstrated the effectiveness of the video intervention in garnering support for resource redistribution. This breakthrough highlights the successful translation of psychological interventions into video format, a crucial insight as we move forward in testing various interventions in this medium. Moreover, few studies have explored the effects of psychological interventions on resource redistribution, emphasizing the broader applicability of these interventions beyond prejudice reduction.
In the remaining phase of our project, we aim to conclude the intervention tournaments and subject them to various studies, aligning with our initial plan. We anticipate that our findings will offer fresh perspectives on the use of personalized interventions to enhance intergroup relations.