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Naive Realism: Implications for Social Conflict and Misunderstanding

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Lee Ross at Stanford University
Lee Ross
Andrew Ward at University of Bedfordshire
Andrew Ward
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Naive Realism:
Implications for Social Conflict and
Misunderstanding
by
Lee Ross and Andrew Ward
Working Paper No. 48
May 1995
Stanford Center on Conflict and Negotiation
Crown Quadrangle
Stanford University
Stanford, California 94305-8610
... The shortest definition of naive realism is Ross et al. (1996) did as follows: ...
... Or c) the individual or group in question may be biased (interpreting evidence or advancing from evidence to conclusions) because of ideology, self-interest, or some other distorted personal influence." (Ross et al., 1996) When these principles are carefully examined, it is more clearly understood that naive realism is the situation where the individual believes that his/her own reality is absolutely true and that others beliefs are not true for any reason stated above. Nasie et al., (2014) Nasie et al., (2014 regard this situation as a socio-psychological barrier. ...
The Relationship Between Political Discourses and Naive Realism
Conference Paper
Full-text available
  • Jul 2022
Recently, political discourses have been quite harsh and have reached the level of hostility - with the upcoming elections - are frequently featured on social media. Contrary to what is known, it is seen that political actors and political supporters often refer to these discourses. Naive realism is one of the mental reasons that can justify people living in the same society and peacefully communicating with each other in daily life, making hostile discourses on social media. This study aims to obtain the pattern of naive realism, which has an important place among the causes of conflict in social and political psychology on social media (in particular, Twitter). It has become a common practice to use fake accounts to avoid the legal sanctions of increasing hate and hostility on social media. There are essential findings in the research that hate speech takes place on digital platforms and is tried to be spread with fake accounts (Burnap & Williams, 2015; Schmidt & Wiegand, 2017; Tulkens et al., 2016). Although states try legal infrastructures to combat such crimes, social media platforms insist on not sharing user information. In the current situation where user information or legal intervention is not enough, one of the ways to prevent false/false or hostile publications is to raise awareness (Al Serhan & Elareshi, 2019). To raise awareness, it is necessary to know what the issue is. For example, dizziness and vomiting symptoms are considered pregnancy suspicion for a newly married woman. Because there is a pattern of these symptoms, this pattern gives the person this doubt. There are patterns in social phenomena, just as in this medical example. It is considered that depicting these patterns in social media is vital to strengthen awareness. When people meet physically in daily life, the essential determinant in their relations with each other is the concept of trust. People do not want to meet with people they do not trust and are shy to respect their words (Büyükdağ & Bal, 2020). When one feels the same insecurity on social media, it can also prevent the individual from being exposed to dangerous information regarding hate speech. The most basic question sought by this study is “Anti animosity etc., in social media. Can it be determined with the existing social media analysis tools whether the publications containing the dangers come from reliable sources? A pattern of naive realism was sought with the tools and techniques expressed in the method section. To do this, the characteristics of naive realism were examined. In the literature section, the concept of naive realism has been tried to be discussed in detail. Social network analysis was used to determine the features of naive realism in social media content and identify broadcast networks that would threaten social peace. By examining the structures of social networks, “truth” and “-density” coefficients were tried to be obtained (Kaur et al., 2019). In the last part of the study, evaluations regarding the findings are given.
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... Specifically, since we found that the direct path between the perceived gap in external threat perceptions and affective polarization remains significant in the mediation models, examining additional mediators that operate as part of the mechanism can be valuable. For example, it is possible that perceiving the opposing ideological group as assessing the external threat inaccurately might appear foolish, naïve, biased (Lee and Ward 1996), or even unethical (Kubin, Kachanoff, and Gray 2022), and either of these assessments might fuel affective polarization. Alternatively, the perceived internal gap can lead to an emotional response of disappointment, anger, or disgust, potentially strengthening the inner divide. ...
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Growing affective polarization, or animosity between competing ideological groups, threatens to tear apart democratic societies worldwide. In nations that are facing external conflicts, the threat arising from these conflicts may boost internal cohesion and potentially reduce the internal threat of fragmentation. However, in the current study, we analyze survey datasets from two societies embedded in intractable conflicts, South Korea (N = 897) and Israel (N = 504), and demonstrate that gaps in the perception of the external threat between competing ideological groups are related to higher levels of affective polarization within these societies. We also find support for a mechanism that explains this trend: an internal threat from the ideological outgroup. We discuss the implications of our findings for the study of conflicts' impact on intragroup processes, specifically affective polarization, and for the understanding of how such processes might perpetuate the conflict itself.
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... Video is more cognitively and emotionally arousing and vivid than other forms of evidence (Bell & Loftus, 1985;Sherwin, Feigenson, & Spiesel, 2006), giving jurors the impression that they are perceiving relevant information directly (Mnookin & West, 2013). This property of seemingly direct access leads perceivers to evaluate video with a naïve realism, the sense that what is being conveyed is a complete, objective reflection of events as they really are (Feigenson & Spiesel, 2009;Ross & Ward, 1996). This sense of realism may disincline perceivers to question how the images were constructed and what information is excluded from the display (Feigenson & Spiesel, 2009). ...
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... These high-profile cases demonstrate how the opportunity to see a video in court can often be presented as equivalent to witnessing an event directly from the scene of its unfolding. It is not surprising, then, that the logic of naïve realism (e.g., Feigenson and Spiesel, 2009;Ross and Ward, 1996) can be observed, albeit differently, in both cases. What is particularly interesting is that naïve realism can shape the rhetorical framing of video despite the simultaneous reliance on different visual and verbal strategies that render the footage meaningful as evidence. ...
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... While digital experiences can be psychologically real to the person immersed in the metaverse (Wolfendale, 2007), it is often discounted by outside observers because no activity takes place in the physical world. Such discounting stems from traditional views of falsity, which assume that only physical experiences (i.e., those derived using unaided biological senses like sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell) are real (Ross & Ward, 1996) and that synthetic, digital forms of experience are imaginary, inconsequential and are not real. ...
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The Metaverse has the potential to form the next pervasive computing archetype that can transform many aspects of work and life at a societal level. Despite the many forecasted benefits from the metaverse, its negative outcomes have remained relatively unexplored with the majority of views grounded on logical thoughts derived from prior data points linked with similar technologies, somewhat lacking academic and expert perspective. This study responds to the dark side perspectives through informed and multifaceted narratives provided by invited leading academics and experts from diverse disciplinary backgrounds. The metaverse dark side perspectives covered include: technological and consumer vulnerability, privacy, and diminished reality, human–computer interface, identity theft, invasive advertising, misinformation, propaganda, phishing, financial crimes, terrorist activities, abuse, pornography, social inclusion, mental health, sexual harassment and metaverse-triggered unintended consequences. The paper concludes with a synthesis of common themes, formulating propositions, and presenting implications for practice and policy.
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... While digital experiences can be psychologically real to the person immersed in the metaverse (Wolfendale, 2007), it is often discounted by outside observers because no activity takes place in the physical world. Such discounting stems from traditional views of falsity, which assume that only physical experiences (i.e., those derived using unaided biological senses like sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell) are real (Ross & Ward, 1996) and that synthetic, digital forms of experience are imaginary, inconsequential and are not real. ...
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The Metaverse has the potential to form the next pervasive computing archetype that can transform many aspects of work and life at a societal level. Despite the many forecasted benefits from the metaverse, its negative outcomes have remained relatively unexplored with the majority of views grounded on logical thoughts derived from prior data points linked with similar technologies, somewhat lacking academic and expert perspective. This study responds to the dark side perspectives through informed and multifaceted narratives provided by invited leading academics and experts from diverse disciplinary backgrounds. The metaverse dark side perspectives covered include: technological and consumer vulnerability, privacy, and diminished reality, human–computer interface, identity theft, invasive advertising, misinformation, propaganda, phishing, financial crimes, terrorist activities, abuse, pornography, social inclusion, mental health, sexual harassment and metaverse-triggered unintended consequences. The paper concludes with a synthesis of common themes, formulating propositions, and presenting implications for practice and policy.
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