Can science-based interventions tamp down polarization?

Surveys also find that cross-partisan hostility is at least partly a matter of misperception: People tend to view members of the opposing party as being far more hostile and extreme in their views than most of them really are. So, if people can somehow get past the media stereotypes and see each other as complex human beings, says Jan Voelkel, a sociology postdoc at Cornell University, “the image that emerges is so much better than the expectation that the conversations tend to go quite well.”

Researchers have had some success in their search for rigorous, reliable, and lasting ways to foster this kind of rapprochement.