Why is it so hard to change your mind?

“The Hardest Subjects,” Writer Leo Tolstoy once wrote“can be explained to the dullest man, if he has not already formed any idea of ​​them; but the simplest thing cannot be explained to the most intelligent man, if he is firmly convinced that he already knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, what is laid before him.

Until recently, I would have agreed. A whole body of psychological research has suggested this many people are extremely resistant to change of mind and there is very little we can do to remove their blinkers. This, combined with the rise of social media, was thought to be behind the growing political polarization of the past two decades.

So you can imagine my joy at finding it new paper which gives some grounds for optimism. According to Stephanie Dolbier at UCLA and her colleagues, psychologists have already discovered many techniques for opening our minds—and it all depends on our ability to withstand emotional discomfort.

Like many psychological traits, open-mindedness naturally varies among populations. You can measure this by rating your agreement with a series of statements such as:

• People must consider evidence that contradicts the conclusions they prefer
• When faced with a puzzling question, we should try to consider more than one possible answer before reaching a conclusion

and:

• Changing your mind is a sign of weakness

As you might expect, people who strongly agree with the first two statements and disagree with the third are considered more open-minded than those who believe it is best to stick to one point of view without considering other options or updating their opinions based on new evidence.

Active open-mindedness comes with many benefits. Philip Tetlock at the University of Pennsylvania and his colleagues, for example, have found that it improves people’s ability to predicts the outcome of geopolitical events. In a two-year competition involving over 700 participants, he found that the top performers—whom he calls “superforecasters”—were much more likely to change their minds in the face of new evidence than the average person. Mental flexibility of this kind can also protect us from irrational beliefs such as conspiracy theorieswhich usually rely on people’s tendency to jump to conclusions about the way the world works.

For most of us, however, practicing an open mind is often easier said than done. At the very least, we may feel some discomfort in admitting that our judgment was wrong in the past, so we cling to our old opinions to avoid losing face. Worse, our beliefs are often intertwined with core elements of our identity, such as our religion or political identity, in a complex tapestry. Loosen one of these knots and it can feel like our entire sense of self is about to unravel, which can be a terrifying prospect.

Therefore, to protect our egos, the brain engages in “motivated reasoning,” which involves seeking justifications to reinforce our underlying assumptions, even if it relies on logical fallacies and misinformation or causes us to lash out at people who question us.

Keeping an open mind therefore requires considerable strength to resist this mental discomfort – and that can start with greater emotional awareness. Dolbier and her colleagues point out research from 2019, for example, for “wise reasoning”. People who offered more nuanced descriptions of their emotions were found to be better able to consider different perspectives than those who simply labeled their moods as “good” or “bad.”

It makes sense. If I have high emotional awareness, I might realize that I’m not so much angry at another person’s stupidity for not seeing something from my point of view, but frustrated at my own inarticulateness in trying to get a point across to them and afraid of looking stupid. This realization may then encourage me to examine my argument more critically—and possibly change my mind. I mean, maybe they’re not wrong, but I’m letting my emotions get in the way of figuring this out.

The role of emotional awareness may explain why attentiveness it helps some people think more rationally. By paying attention to their internal timing, they are better equipped to recognize and avoid typical knee-jerk reactions to others’ viewpoints, forming more balanced opinions as a result.

If meditation is not your thing, we might consider a a little role playing. In one study, people were taught to internalize and respond to upsetting events “like scientists, objectively and analytically.” After this training, they tended to be more open-minded about some of the most polarizing topics, such as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Quite remarkably, follow-up experiments found that the benefits of this brief intervention persisted for at least five months after the initial test.

Alternatively, we can place the point of disagreement in the larger context of our lives. In the midst of a disagreement, we often forget that we are multifaceted beings with many values ​​and talents, and feel that our entire sense of self-respect depends on being right about this. Briefly describing one of these other qualities about ourselves—be it our loyalty to our friends, our creativity, or our sense of humor—can therefore reducing the sense of threat when faced with differing opinions. However, this only seems to work if one is already aware of one’s own potential for bias based on one’s existing beliefs, again emphasizing the importance of self-awareness.

Finally, we can reframe difficult feelings as a sign of growth. Experiments have found that simply reminding people of their ability to build their cognitive abilities can encourage them to do so respond more constructively to people with opposing views. With this mindset, we can see our mistakes as learning opportunities, making it easier to accept that our previous views may have been wrong.

Dolbier and her colleagues emphasize that many of these techniques need to be tested more thoroughly in a wider variety of contexts, and many more may emerge along the way. But the existing research at least offers a place to start—and I’ll certainly put some of these strategies into practice the next time I find my beliefs challenged.

David Robson’s latest book is The Laws of Relationship: 13 Social Strategies That Will Transform Your Life. If you have a question you’d like answered in his column, please send him a message at davidrobson.me/contact.

topics: