相手の主張を変える方法！？ / How to change someone's political views
日本語
こんちゃっす、私です。
「choice blindness」という言葉聞いたことがありますか？日本語では「選択盲」というらしいです。
２００５年、ある実験が行われました。
実験参加者に2枚の顔写真を見せ、より魅力的な方を選んでもらいました。
その後参加者に自分で選んだ方の写真を渡すのですが、マジックのトリックを使い、自分の選んでない方の写真を渡しました。
結果、ほとんどの参加者は何の疑いもなく写真を受け取り、その写真を選んだ理由を説明しだしました。
この「選択盲」は様々な分野でも実験されてきましたが、今回は具体的な政策に関して調査されました。
参加者は先ほどと同じように、偽の回答を与えられ、何故その選択をしたのか意見を求められました。
結果は、顔写真の時と同じでした。
例えば消費税の問題。
初めは高い消費税に賛成だったのが、「どちらともいえない」に変わり、最終的には「消費税反対」に意見が変わる、といったものです。
人間は何かを「選択」する時、その意見を批判から守ろうとします。
つまり、思考に柔軟性がなくなってしまう。
そこで強制的に別の「選択」を与えてみると、今度はその「偽の選択」を自分の意見として守ろうとします。
トリックは分かりました。
では、これを実践に応用できるのでしょうか。
ポイントは、どうやって相手に気づかれずに「偽の選択」を与えるか、ですね。
個人的には結構難しい課題かな、と思います。
ただ、思考に柔軟性を与えるのが目的ならば方法はありそうです。
例えば、自分とは別の選択の利点を強制的にでも挙げさせてみる、というのは有効な方法に思えます。
これは自分の思考力を鍛えるのに使えそうですね。
English
Recent study showed that our political views can be flexible and fragile.
A phenomenon known as choice blindness was discovered by Swedish researchers:
They presented participants with 2 photos of faces and asked the participants to choose the photo they thought was more attractive, and then handed participants that photo. Using a trick used in stage magic, when participants received the photo it had been switched to the person not chosen by the participant (the less attractive photo).
Remarkably, most participants accepted this card as their own choice and then proceeded to give arguments for why they had chosed that face in the first place.
This result revealed a gap between our choices and our ability to rationalize outcomes. This finding has been applied to other fields such as taste for jam, financial decisions, and eye-witness testimony.
This choice blindess was used to see whether the techniqu can be applied to our political views.
Participants were given false-feedback about their choices concerning actual political questions (e.g., climate taxes on consumer goods) and then asked to state their views a second time that same day, and again 1 week later.
The result was the same as previous experiments. Pariticipants' responses were shifted considerabley in the direction of the manipulation. For example, those who originally had favoured higher taxes were more likely to be undecided or even opposed to it.
These effects lasted up to a week later. When they were asked to give argument or rationalization, the changes in their opinion were larger.
What's the mechanism of this human behavior?
People usually try to defend their choices from criticism. This thinking process likely fixes their flexibilities for considering the benefits of other choices; therefore, the switch of the choice they make removes those defensive attitudes in a forceful manner.
Can it be used in our daily life?
The key point is that how we can switch their choices obliviously in a clever way.
If this difficult (the most difficult) obstacle is achieved, yes we can.
However, enhancing the flexibility of our thinking seems to be easy:
- enumerate the pros of the choice we did not choose
Simple enough?
That's how it is with our mind as you've read this page....
