Opinion Science

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#92: Can We Fix Social Media? with Andy Guess Mar 25, 2024

Show notes

Andy Guess studies how social media platforms shape people’s political views. He’s an assistant professor of politics and public affairs at Princeton University. Last summer, he was part of a big team that released four papers on their analyses and experiments in social media all at the same time. The research was in collaboration with Meta, the company responsible for Facebook and Instagram.
Andy and the team were able to dissect how often people on these platforms are exposed to political opinions, particularly from people whose opinions differ from their own. They were also able to conduct experiments on these platforms. By turning some of the knobs and levers, could they influence people’s engagement on these platforms and even change their political views?

The four big research papers that all came out together are:

Guess et al. (2023, Science): How do social media feed algorithms affect attitudes and behavior in an election campaign?
Guess et al. (2023, Science): Reshares on social media amplify political news but do not detectably affect beliefs or opinions
Gonzalez-Bailon et al. (2023, Science): Asymmetric ideological segregation in exposure to political news on Facebook
Nyhan et al. (2023, Nature): Like-minded sources on Facebook are prevalent but not polarizing

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Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

#91: Being a Social Science Maverick with Sendhil Mullainathan Mar 11, 2024

Show notes

Sendhil Mullainathan does a lot of things, and he does them well. He’s a professor of Computation and Behavioral Science at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. I originally talked to Sendhil for our podcast series, They Thought We Were Ridiculous. He was well-positioned to give his perspective on a contentious, interdisciplinary field of social science called “behavioral economics.” But nowadays, behavioral economics is mainstream, but Sendhil has continued to study big questions that cut across the typical academic boundaries between disciplines. We talk about AI, economics, and racial bias.

You can listen to our full series on behavioral economics here (Sendhil’s voice pops up in episodes 3 and 4).

Also, the study we discuss testing racial discrimination in hiring practices was first reported in this 2003 paper in American Economic Review.

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Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

"...Ridiculous" Ep. 5: The Future! Feb 26, 2024

Show notes

To look into the future of Behavioral Economics, we talked to three young researchers who are pushing the field further. A new generation of researchers is striving to understand decision-making in the developing world, how brains process economic decisions, and how bigger, more transparent scientific methods can shed light on basic principles of choice.
This is the fifth episode of a special series called: "They Thought We Were Ridiculous: The Unlikely Story of Behavioral Economics."
*Correction: During Rahul Bhui's section of the episode, we mistakenly said that people "don't take as many risks when they're framed as potential losses…even though they're relatively happy to take risks when they're framed as potential gains." We accidentally got this flipped! In truth, research on prospect theory shows that people tend to be risk-seeking in the loss domain but risk-averse in the gain domain.
For more information, check out the Opinion Science webpage for this series: http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/episode/they-thought-we-were-ridiculous/

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Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

"...Ridiculous" Ep. 4: Behavioral Economics Goes Mainstream Feb 26, 2024

Show notes

Eventually, Behavioral Economics emerged as an influential perspective. It’s become mainstream in Economics, and it’s helped inform programs and policies that affect real people every day.
This is the fourth episode of a special series called: "They Thought We Were Ridiculous: The Unlikely Story of Behavioral Economics."
For more information, check out the Opinion Science webpage for this series: http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/episode/they-thought-we-were-ridiculous/

Join me over at Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/OpinionScience

Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

"...Ridiculous" Ep. 3: Children of Unlikely Parents Feb 26, 2024

Show notes

Behavioral Economics was using psychology to understand economics, but what did economists and psychologists think about their unexpected marriage? Slowly, this fledgling field weathered a flurry of criticism from both sides as it doggedly held onto data-driven ideas about economic decision-making.
This is the third episode of a special series called: "They Thought We Were Ridiculous: The Unlikely Story of Behavioral Economics."
For more information, check out the Opinion Science webpage for this series: http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/episode/they-thought-we-were-ridiculous/

Join me over at Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/OpinionScience

Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

"...Ridiculous" Ep. 2: Importing Psychology Feb 26, 2024

Show notes

Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky were two psychologists with big ideas about how people made decisions. Their careful research launched a brand new way of understanding people’s choices, and it helped fan the flames of Behavioral Economics.
This is the second episode of a special series called: "They Thought We Were Ridiculous: The Unlikely Story of Behavioral Economics."
For more information, check out the Opinion Science webpage for this series: http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/episode/they-thought-we-were-ridiculous/

Join me over at Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/OpinionScience

Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

"...Ridiculous" Ep. 1: Beyond Anomalies Feb 26, 2024

Show notes

For years, neoclassical economists have made an unusual assumption—that people are rational decision-makers. But a few social scientists have dared to challenge that assumption. They’ve collected observations, analyzed data, and presented their perspective. Their work would usher in a new era of Economics.
This is the first episode of a special series called: "They Thought We Were Ridiculous: The Unlikely Story of Behavioral Economics."
For more information, check out the Opinion Science webpage for this series: http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/episode/they-thought-we-were-ridiculous/

Join me over at Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/OpinionScience

Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

Introducing: "They Thought We Were Ridiculous: The Unlikely Story of Behavioral Economics" Feb 12, 2024

Show notes

Coming February 26th! I team up with the guys at Behavioral Groovesto produce a 5-part podcast series on behavioral economics. We tell the story of how some young social scientists took issue with assumptions that economists were making about how people make decisions, and they ended up transforming the field. Their insights went on to shape governments and businesses around the world.
The whole series will drop on the Opinion Science podcast feed on February 26th. See you then!

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Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

#90: How Prejudice Works with Jack Dovidio Jan 29, 2024

Show notes

Jack Dovidio's work is at the heart of how we currently understand the psychology of prejudice. He's spent his career considering where prejudice comes from, how people express it, how it biases people's judgments and behaviors, and what we could do to address it. He's an emeritus professor at Yale University, and he's also just a really pleasant guy to talk to. In our conversation, we cover his early days as a social psychologist studying when people will help each other out, his research on "aversive racism," and his work studying the effects of racial bias in medical treatment.
The new book out by Jack, Lou Penner, and others is: "Unequal Health: Anti-Black Racism and the Threat to America's Health"
Things that come up in the intro:

Gordon Allport’s “The Nature of Prejudice”
Polling over time on interracial marriage (Gallup) and racial progress (Pew)
Economists sell baseball cards on eBay to learn about racism (Ayres et al., 2015)
A retrospective on The Nature of Prejudice (Dovidio et al., 2005)

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Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

#89: Opinions of our Partners with Jim McNulty Jan 15, 2024

Show notes

Jim McNulty is a professor of psychology at Florida State University. He studies close relationships, and in this episode, we talk about his research on "automatic partner attitudes." When someone sees their romantic partner, their feelings about that person spring automatically to mind. And sometimes those feelings conflict with what they openly SAY they feel about their partner. Jim shares his findings from studies that measure people's feelings toward their partners.
Things that come up in this episode

A longitudinal study of newlyweds shows how automatic attitudes are related to relationship outcomes years later (McNulty et al., 2013)
Automatic evaluations of one's partner are related to relationship satisfaction (Turner & McNulty, 2020)
Interventions that improve people's evaluations of their partners improve relationships outcomes (McNulty et al., 2017)
A recent paper summarizing Jim's work on automatic evaluations of one's partner (Faure et al., 2024)

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Learn more about Opinion Science and catch up on all the episodes at http://opinionsciencepodcast.com/.

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