nour_kteily

There's a lot of work suggesting that Us vs. Them tendencies are a very common feature of human psychology. Mina Cikara and colleagues (along with my frequent collaborator Emile Bruneau) have done some fascinating work in this area (see http://cdp.sagepub.com/content/20/3/149.short). People like Josh Greene at Harvard psych have also written extensively about us vs. them tendencies (see his book Moral Tribes). Some work suggests that even group membership created on highly minimal grounds (like whether you overestimate or underestimate the number of jellybeans in a jar) can generate ingroup favoritism. So, I do definitely think that we have a high capacity for intergroup hostility.

That said, I don't think these dynamics are insurmountable. Josh Greene and Paul Bloom and others have written about using rational thought/compassion to overcome intergroup biases. In some of my own work linked above (in my intro), we've been showing how to reduce the tendency to blame entire outgroup (e.g., all Muslims) for the acts of a few (ISIS attackers). Other work has shown that creating common goals between groups can reduce animus. As people like Steve Pinker have pointed out, we've also made tremendous gains in reducing inter-group violence across human history through creating certain norms (like universal human rights) and institutions (like the E.U. and other entities that link groups to one another economically and politically). So, it's hard, but not insurmountable!

There are a few reasons why it might: some subtle forms of dehumanization involves simply treating others like a number (for example: thinking of an athlete as nothing more than his/her stats). This is facilitated to some extent, I would think, by the social distance. You're less likely to see an athlete as nothing more than his/her RBI if you were sitting face-to-face with them. Interacting online versus in person similarly creates a social distance, and removes not only social cues that can reduce misunderstandings but also reduces the "social tuning" behaviors we engage in when we're actually face-to-face with someone. Work on drone strikes versus face-to-face combat relatedly suggests that it's easier to kill someone when you're pushing a button thousands of miles away. I'm not sure if there's work specifically on anonymous social networks vs ones where people use their real identity, but my guess is that anonymity would facilitate any nasty tendencies by removing the reputational concerns that are a major part of human psychology.

I'm not sure how unique academia per se is in this regard, but like other workplaces with a hierarchy, I think it's quite likely that those occupying a higher rank (e.g., professors) sometimes overlook the minds of those who occupy a lower rank (e.g., graduate students), potentially sometimes treating them as means to an end. I've not tackled this issue specifically in my own work, but I think it's incumbent on those with higher ranks to engage in perspective taking and remind themselves that they're dealing with human beings on the other side.

One of the disconcerting things about working in this area is seeing just how dehumanizing the rhetoric has become across party lines. I'm of the mindset that robust critique is undoubtedly necessary, and I don't think that we can or even should avoid speaking out strongly against issues when we think its our duty to do so (for example, speaking out against intolerance). That said, I don't think it's helpful or productive when we dehumanize those we disagree with, even those we disagree with to our core. For one, it makes the other side that much less likely to listen to us and engage with us. And secondly, our work on meta-dehumanization (i.e., feeling dehumanized by others) suggests that dehumanizing another is only likely to provoke their own dehumanization of you (provoking vicious cycles of conflict). To change someone's mind you need to see and appeal to their mind; dehumanization doesn't help on that front.

Hi! Fascinating question. I have to admit that I'm not especially expert on the bases of anthropomorphism, but to the best of my knowledge, the tendency to see humanity in non-human entities is importantly facilitated by a lack of social connection (e.g., loneliness; think Tom Hanks and Wilson in Cast Away). One reasonable prediction, then, is that fulfilling the need for social connection with other humans might reduce the tendency to ascribe humanity to other entities (even to other humans). As far as I'm aware, there is indeed some evidence supporting that prediction.

Some people have theorized that a lack of social connection and a sense of social isolation contribute to the dehumanizing attitudes of extremist groups, but there has not yet been solid empirical confirmation of that. Even if that is one important factor, I think that there are others that are likely not shared with the tendency to anthropomorphize: for example, there is good reason to think that feeling physically threatened by another group predicts overt dehumanization of them; I suspect that physical threat would be less relevant to the tendency to anthropomorphize.