People's lay beliefs about the (dis)utility of outgroup empathy can have important implications for their social and political attitudes. In this line of research, we investigate how inspiring people to view cross-partisan empathy more positively can not only increase people’s interest in engaging across political divides, but also makes them more convincing advocates of their own beliefs.

People's views regarding right and wrong strongly influence their group affiliations, their desire for collective action, and their policy endorsements. We have ongoing empirical projects investigating the precursors and downstream consequences of political attitude moralization. In one such project, we have been using natural language processing to examine how political topics - such as immigration, abortion, and healthcare - can become imbued with moral relevance through time and partisan dynamics.

Santos, L., Voelkel, J. Willer, R., & Zaki, J. (2022) Belief in the Utility of Cross-Partisan Empathy Reduces Partisan Animosity and Facilitates Persuasion. Psychological Science (view)

Santos, L., Voelkel, J. Willer, R., & Zaki, J. (submitted for publication) Positive Beliefs About Cross-Partisan Empathy Can Strengthen Americans’ Support for Democracy

Voelkel, J., Stagnaro, M., Chu, J., … Santos, L., …& Willer, R. Megastudy Identifying Effective Interventions to Strengthen Americans’ Democratic Attitudes (submitted for publication) (view)

Roy, E., … Santos, L., & Axt, J. Contest Study to Reduce Discrimination in Social Judgment. (submitted for publication)