Dogmatic people seek less information even when uncertain
University College London
People who are dogmatic about their views seek less information and make less accurate judgments as a result, even on simple matters unrelated to politics, according to a study led by UCL and Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics researchers.
The
researchers say their findings, published in PNAS, point to
differences in thinking patterns that lead people to hold rigid opinions.
First
author Lion Schulz, a PhD candidate at the Max Planck Institute in Germany who
began the research while at UCL, said: "Anecdotally, it seems that
dogmatic people are less interested in information that might change their
mind. However, it was unclear if this is because a specific opinion is of high
importance to them or if more fundamental processes are at play that transcend
specific opinions."
Dogmatic
people are characterised by a belief that their worldview reflects an absolute
truth and are often resistant to change their mind, for example when it comes
to partisan issues. This tendency can have societal impacts by polarising
political, scientific and religious debates. However, the cognitive drivers of
dogmatism are still poorly understood.
To investigate this, the researchers asked over 700 people to perform a simple decision-making task. Participants saw two boxes with flickering dots and had to decide which box contained more of the dots. Critically, after the participants had made an initial choice, the researchers gave them the chance to view another, clearer version of the boxes. They then made a final decision.
Schulz
explained: "This mirrors many real-life situations -- for example, when we
hear a rumour but aren't sure if it's true. Do we share it, or do we check a
credible source beforehand?"
Joint
first author, Dr Max Rollwage (Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging at UCL
and Max Planck UCL Centre for Computational Psychiatry & Ageing Research)
said: "By using simple tasks, we were able to minimise motivational or
social influences and pin down drivers of altered evidence processing that
contribute to dogmatic beliefs."
The
task was followed by a comprehensive set of questionnaires that allowed the
researchers to measure participants' political orientation and levels of
dogmatism.
Dogmatic
individuals and moderates did not differ in their accuracy or confidence of
their decisions. However, the researchers found that more dogmatic participants
were more likely to decline the helpful additional information.
The
differences between more and less dogmatic participants were especially large
when participants had little confidence in a decision. Senior author Dr Steve
Fleming (Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging at UCL, Max Planck UCL Centre
for Computational Psychiatry & Ageing Research and UCL Experimental
Psychology) said: "Previous work has found that there is a close link
between how confident we feel and whether or not we seek out new information.
In the current study we found that this link was weaker in more dogmatic individuals."
In
general, the reduced search was detrimental, with more dogmatic people being
less accurate in their final judgments.
Dr
Fleming added: "It is striking that we could detect links between
dogmatism about issues such as politics, and information-seeking in a simple
online game. This tells us that real-world dogmatism isn't just a feature of
specific groups or opinions but may be associated with more fundamental
cognitive processes."
The
study highlights that simply having corrective information available does not
necessarily mean people will consume it.
Schulz
said: "This is particularly relevant today. We have never been so free to
decide if we have enough evidence about something or whether we should seek out
further information from a reliable source before believing it.
"It
is also important to stress that the differences between more and less dogmatic
people were subtle, and we don't know yet how they would manifest when
considering real-world information such as news about political parties. In the
end, it's a cautionary tale, whether we think of ourselves as dogmatic or not:
when uncertain, it might be wise to check the information again."
The
researchers are now trying to further unravel the underlying cognitive
algorithms which trigger people to search for further information in situations
of uncertainty.