The Power of Reiterating Your Reason for Holding a Political Position

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The idea of reiterating your own reason for holding a political position, it's not crazy for very new political issues. The fact that you have such hard numbers in your research of life, you can actually get people to buy talking about what they care about. You can get them to change what they support on this substantive issue. And so we found that making a new sort of environmental protection argument in terms of purity and sanctity tended to resignate more with conservatives than one that was just about protection and caring for the environment.

Is your family, community, or even your country more divided than ever? Today’s guest Robb Willer is here to share some compelling insights on how we might bridge the ideological divide and offer some intuitive advice on ways to be more persuasive. Robb is a professor of sociology, psychology and organizational behavior at Stanford University. He studies the role of morality in politics. His research shows how moral values, typically a source of ideological division, can also be used to bring people together. His political research has investigated various topics, including economic inequality, racial prejudice, masculine overcompensation and Americans' views of climate change. Willer's writing has appeared in the New York Times and the Washington Post, including his op-eds "The Secret to Political Persuasion" and "Is the Environment a Moral Cause?” Willer received a Ph.D from Cornell University and a BA from the University of Iowa. Before becoming a professor, he worked as a dishwasher, construction worker, mover, line cook and union organizer.