Here’s the first in a series of sketchbook-style videos I’m doing on the topic of tribalism and critical thinking.

I really do think a certain degree of tribal literacy needs to be a part of everyone’s critical thinking toolkit.

Below are some links to relevant readings.

“What is a tribe?”

• I’m using the word “tribe” to refer to social networks of people who share common interests or other features, and who (ideally) enjoy the many benefits of social connection through interaction and participation within these networks.
  • This usage combines two independent features that are not always combined in the literature:
    1. being a member of a social group based on shared characteristics and interests
    2. being a beneficiary of psychological and physical benefits in virtue of participation in such groups
  • “Tribe” also has a historical usage within internet culture, where it assumes that these groups are virtual communities (“digital tribe”). My usage is more general.
  • Marketing guru Seth Godin popularized the term in his 2014 Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us , where he connected it to new business models that revolve around serving a tribe.
  • Journalist and novelist Sebastian Junger’s 2015 book Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging, which focuses on the psychological experience of soldiers abroad and at home, reviews the anthropological roots of human sociality in tribal bonding, and makes broad claims about the negative effects of fragmentation and alienation in modern society. Worth looking at.

“Us vs Them” Psychology

• There’s a large and diverse literature on the psychology of in-groups and out-groups, the social character of identity, and how our moral and political psychology is tuned to group identities.
  • Henri Tajfel‘s pioneering work on social identity and group categorization, elaborated later by himself and his students as “self-categorization” theory.
    • So-called “minimal group studies” show that in-group favoritism can occur even when the grouping is completely arbitrary (e.g. using a coin toss to split participants into a ‘heads’ group and a ‘tails’ group).
  • The psychology of in-groups and out-groups: in-group favoritism, out-group derogation, group polarization, group homogeneity …
• The biology and neurochemistry of “Us vs Them” thinking
• The biological and cultural evolution of human “groupishness”
  • Joe Henrich, The Secret of Our Success
  • Yuval Harari, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
  • Evolution of cooperation

Tribalism and Moral Psychology

• How our moral psychology follows the contours of our group affiliations
• Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion
  • Moral foundations theory
• Joshua Greene, Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap Between Us and Them

Tribalism and Human Cognition

• How human cognition is influenced by, and dependent upon, group affiliation and social identity
• Steven Sloman and Philip Fernbach, The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone
• Lisa Feldman Barrett, How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain
• Jay Van Bavel (and colleagues): Social Perception and Evaluation Lab
  • “Perceiving the World Through Group-Colored Glasses: A Perceptual Model of Intergroup Relations” (Y. Jenny Xiao, Géraldine Coppin & Jay J. Van Bavel)
  • “The Group Mind: The Pervasive Influence of Social Identity on Cognition” (Jay J. Van Bavel, Leor M. Hackel, and Y. Jenny Xiao)
  • The partisan brain (video interview)
• Dan Kahan (and colleagues): Cultural Cognition
  • “Cultural Cognition of Scientific Consensus“
  • Cultural Cognition Glossary (this is a great resource if you’re reading Kahan’s papers)
• filter bubbles

Polarization

• What are the factors that influence how similar or different we feel we are from one another?
• Shanto Iyengar (and colleagues): Stanford’s Political Communication Lab
  • “Affect, Not Ideology: A Social Identity Perspective on Polarization“
  • “Fear and Loathing across Party Lines: New Evidence on Group Polarization“
  • “How We Became Bitter Political Enemies“
  • “The Strengthening of Partisan Affect”
    • “Partisanship continues to divide Americans. Using data from the American National Election Studies (ANES), we find that partisans not only feel more negatively about the opposing party, but also that this negativity has become more consistent and has a greater impact on their political participation. We find that while partisan animus began to rise in the 1980s, it has grown dramatically over the past two decades. As partisan affect has intensified, it is also more structured; ingroup favoritism is increasingly associated with outgroup animus. Finally, hostility toward the opposing party has eclipsed positive affect for ones’ own party as a motive for political participation.”
• Ezra Klein, “Something is breaking American politics, but it’s not social media“
• Simon Kuper, “Loneliness is Contributing to Our Increasingly Tribal Politics“
• Political stress syndrome: “Post-election stress disorder’ strikes on both sides“
• Group polarization
• Auto-segregation

Social Connection and Social Cohesion

• How we benefit from healthy group identities and social cohesion, and what factors promote or inhibit social cohesion
• the concept of social cohesion (book chapter)
• group cohesiveness
• “Asabiyyah”
• Jane Brody, “Social interaction is critical for mental and physical health“
• demonizing outsiders

I welcome suggestions to add to this list in the comments below.