Although strong disagreements across political lines are nothing new, growing antipathy and even hatred for members of the other side is a problem of pressing concern. This "affective polarization" (i.e. animosity towards one's outgroup) prevents us from forging and sustaining positive relationships crucial to human flourishing, listening to and learning from one another, as well as cooperating on issues of mutual concern for which joint deliberation and coordination are required. 

With this project, a team led by Walter Sinnott-Armstrong at Duke University’s Kenan Institute for Ethics and Paulo Boggio at Mackenzie Presbyterian University, focus on developing and testing a mobile app intervention designed to reduce affective polarization, negative attitudes, and promote positive behaviors towards perceived out-group members. Grounded in theoretical models of affective polarization and the Contact Hypothesis, which suggests that intergroup contact can reduce prejudice, the intervention aims to increase empathy and mutual understanding. Studies with the app will be conducted in two highly polarized contexts — the US and Brazil — to assess the intervention's efficacy and its cross-cultural applicability.

The mobile app was designed to provide people with opportunities to positively engage with their political opponents to demonstrate that “the other side” can be reasonable. Participants engage in cooperative activities, such as completing quizzes on political topics  (e.g., immigration) where each player has access to different information  and each player is quizzed on all the information seen by each member of the team. This setup encourages cooperation, as players must share information and rely on each other to succeed.

Ultimately, the project aims to understand the underlying behavioral mechanisms of affective polarization and evaluate this intervention for effectiveness in mitigating harms that affective polarization can cause in two different cultural contexts.