Social Cognition Center Cologne, Department of Psychology, University of Cologne.
J Pers Soc Psychol. 2018 Apr;114(4):599-619. doi: 10.1037/pspi0000121. Epub 2018 Jan 11.
Nine studies and a meta-analysis test the role of past-focused temporal communication in reducing conservatives' disagreement with liberal political ideas. We propose that conservatives are more prone to warm, affectionate, and nostalgic feelings for past society. Therefore, they are more likely to support political ideas-including those expressing liberal values-that can be linked to a desirable past state (past focus), rather than a desirable future state (future focus) of society. Study 1 supports our prediction that political conservatives are more nostalgic for the past than liberals. Building on this association, we demonstrate that communicating liberal ideas with a past focus increases conservatives' support for leniency in criminal justice (Studies 2a and 2b), gun control (Study 3), immigration (Study 4), social diversity (Study 5), and social justice (Study 6). Communicating messages with a past focus reduced political disagreement (compared with a future focus) between liberals and conservatives by between 30 and 100% across studies. Studies 5 and 6 identify the mediating role of state and trait nostalgia, respectively. Study 7 shows that the temporal communication effect only occurs under peripheral (and not central) information processing. Study 8 shows that the effect is asymmetric; a future focus did not increase liberals' support for conservative ideas. A mixed-effects meta-analysis across all studies confirms that appealing to conservatives' nostalgia with a past-focused temporal focus increases support for liberal political messages (Study 9). A large portion of the political disagreement between conservatives and liberals appears to be disagreement over style, and not content of political issues. (PsycINFO Database Record
九项研究和一项荟萃分析检验了以过去为导向的时间沟通在减少保守派与自由政治观点分歧方面的作用。我们提出，保守派更容易对过去的社会产生温暖、深情和怀旧的情感。因此，他们更有可能支持那些可以与理想的过去状态（过去焦点）联系起来的政治观点，而不是与社会理想的未来状态（未来焦点）联系起来的政治观点。研究 1 支持了我们的预测，即政治保守派比自由派更怀旧。在此基础上，我们证明，以过去为焦点传达自由思想会增加保守派对刑事司法宽大处理（研究 2a 和 2b）、枪支管制（研究 3）、移民（研究 4）、社会多样性（研究 5）和社会正义（研究 6）的支持。与未来焦点相比，通过过去焦点传达信息减少了自由派和保守派之间的政治分歧（在研究中减少了 30%至 100%）。研究 5 和 6 分别确定了状态和特质怀旧的中介作用。研究 7 表明，时间沟通效应仅在边缘（而非中心）信息处理下发生。研究 8 表明，该效应是不对称的；未来焦点并没有增加自由派对保守派思想的支持。所有研究的混合效应荟萃分析证实，用过去为焦点的时间焦点唤起保守派的怀旧之情会增加对自由政治信息的支持（研究 9）。保守派和自由派之间的大部分政治分歧似乎是风格上的分歧，而不是政治问题的内容。
