Intellectual Humility and Perceptions of Political Opponents

The epistemic virtue of intellectual humility (IH) refers to the recognition that personal beliefs might be wrong. In four initial studies, we examined the role of IH in predicting how people perceive their sociopolitical opponents, and the role of IH in people’s willingness to befriend their sociopolitical opponents. We found that people lower in IH are more likely to derogate and less likely to befriend their opponents. In two additional studies, we experimentally explored a possible method with which to make people less likely to derogate opponents and more willing to befriend them. After informing participants about the results of our existing studies showing that people who hold opposing positions do not differ in IH, participants were less likely to derogate opponents and somewhat more willing to befriend them. We discuss the implications of these results for sincere, open discussion, and for reducing social extremism and polarization.