Extreme Opinions Research Articles

Opinion dynamics in two dimensions: domain coarsening leads to stable bi-polarization and anomalous scaling exponents

We study an opinion dynamics model that explores the competition between persuasion and compromise in a population of agents with nearest-neighbor interactions on a two-dimensional square lattice. Each agent can hold either a positive or a negative opinion orientation, and can have two levels of intensity—moderate and extremist. When two interacting agents have the same orientation they become extremists with persuasion probability p, while if they have opposite orientations they become moderate with compromise probability q. These updating rules lead to the formation of same-opinion domains with a coarsening dynamics that depends on the ratio r = p/q. The population initially evolves to a centralized state for small r, where domains are composed of moderate agents and coarsening is without surface tension, and to a bi-polarized state for large r, where domains are formed by extremist agents and coarsening is driven by curvature. Consensus in an extreme opinion is finally reached in a time that scales with the population size N and r as for small r and as for large r. Bi-polarization could be quite stable when the system falls into a striped state where agents organize into single-opinion horizontal, vertical or diagonal bands. An analysis of the stripe dynamics towards consensus allows us to obtain an approximate expression for τ, which shows that the exponent 1.64 is a result of the diffusion of the stripe interfaces combined with their roughness properties.

Incentives Can Reduce Bias in Online Reviews

Online reviews are a powerful means of propagating the reputations of products, services, and even employers. However, existing research suggests that online reviews often suffer from selection bias—people with extreme opinions are more motivated to share them than people with moderate opinions, resulting in biased distributions of reviews. Providing incentives for reviewing has the potential to reduce this selection bias, because incentives can mitigate the motivational deficit of people who hold moderate opinions. Using data from one of the leading employer review companies, Glassdoor, we show that voluntary reviews have a different distribution from incentivized reviews. The likely bias in the distribution of voluntary reviews can affect workers’ choice of employers, because it changes the ranking of industries by average employee satisfaction. Because observational data from Glassdoor are not able to provide a measure of the true distribution of employer reviews, we complement our investigation with a randomized controlled experiment on MTurk. We find that when participants’ decision to review their employer is voluntary, the resulting distribution of reviews differs from the distribution of forced reviews. Moreover, providing relatively high monetary rewards or a pro-social cue as incentives for reviewing reduces this bias. We conclude that while voluntary employer reviews often suffer from selection bias, incentives can significantly reduce bias and help workers make more informed employer choices.

Paths to Polarization: How Extreme Views, Miscommunication, and Random Chance Drive Opinion Dynamics

Understanding the social conditions that tend to increase or decrease polarization is important for many reasons. We study a network‐structured agent‐based model of opinion dynamics, extending a model previously introduced by Flache and Macy (2011), who found that polarization appeared to increase with the introduction of long‐range ties but decrease with the number of salient opinions, which they called the population’s “cultural complexity.” We find the following. First, polarization is strongly path dependent and sensitive to stochastic variation. Second, polarization depends strongly on the initial distribution of opinions in the population. In the absence of extremists, polarization may be mitigated. Third, noisy communication can drive a population toward more extreme opinions and even cause acute polarization. Finally, the apparent reduction in polarization under increased “cultural complexity” arises via a particular property of the polarization measurement, under which a population containing a wider diversity of extreme views is deemed less polarized. This work has implications for understanding the population dynamics of beliefs, opinions, and polarization as well as broader implications for the analysis of agent‐based models of social phenomena.

Incentives Can Reduce Bias in Online Reviews

Online reviews are a powerful means of propagating the reputations of products, services, and even employers. However, existing research suggests that online reviews often suffer from selection bias – people with extreme opinions are more motivated to share them than people with moderate opinions, resulting in biased distributions of reviews. Providing incentives for reviewing has the potential to reduce this selection bias, because incentives can mitigate the motivational deficit of people who hold moderate opinions. Using data from one of the leading employer review companies, Glassdoor, we show that voluntary reviews have a different distribution from incentivized reviews. The likely bias in the distribution of voluntary reviews can affect workers' choice of employers, because it changes the ranking of industries by average employee satisfaction.Because observational data from Glassdoor are not able to provide a measure of the true distribution of employer reviews, we complement our investigation with a randomized controlled experiment on MTurk. We find that when participants' decision to review their employer is voluntary, the resulting distribution of reviews differs from the distribution of forced reviews. Moreover, providing relatively high monetary rewards or a pro-social cue as incentives for reviewing reduces this bias. We conclude that while voluntary employer reviews often suffer from selection bias, incentives can significantly reduce bias and help workers make more informed employer choices.

Steering opinion dynamics via containment control

In this paper, we model the problem of influencing the opinions of groups of individuals as a containment control problem, as in many practical scenarios, the control goal is not full consensus among all the individual opinions, but rather their containment in a certain range, determined by a set of leaders. As in classical bounded confidence models, we consider individuals affected by the confirmation bias, thus tending to influence and to be influenced only if their opinions are sufficiently close. However, here we assume that the confidence level, modeled as a proximity threshold, is not constant and uniform across the individuals, as it depends on their opinions. Specifically, in an extremist society, the most radical agents (i.e., those with the most extreme opinions) have a higher appeal and are capable of influencing nodes with very diverse opinions. The opposite happens in a moderate society, where the more connected (i.e., influential) nodes are those with an average opinion. In three artificial societies, characterized by different levels of extremism, we test through extensive simulations the effectiveness of three alternative containment strategies, where leaders have to select the set of followers they try to directly influence. We found that, when the network size is small, a stochastic time-varying pinning strategy that does not rely on information on the network topology proves to be more effective than static strategies where this information is leveraged, while the opposite happens for large networks where the relevance of the topological information is prevalent.

HADITS-HADITS POLITIK ABAD PERTENGAHAN ISLAM (Suatu Kajian Sosiologis)

Prophet’s hadith has an important role in Islamic teaching. Therefore, a Muslim community, in Islamic medieval century, tried to use hadith to legitimize their group existence and interest, even though they had to fabricate hadith for it. Hadith fabrication, at the beginning, happened because of political problems during Ali bin Abi Thalid order era. In its progression, the appearance of those political hadiths is to give one thing with another to the groups that politically and theologically have extreme opinions.

Social media and the cordon sanitaire

Abstract Much research has sought to map the spread of extreme and populist political ideologies across Western Europe. Despite this, it often fails to explain how these ideologies move from the political fringes to positions of influence, subverting the traditional cordon sanitaire around extreme views. As a result of recent successes by populist actors, a more nuanced understanding of this process is required. This paper posits an explanation for this success, suggesting that the growing pluralisation of the online media environment and the impact of social media content sharing are key to understanding how fringe political actors avoid both overt and implicit barriers to popularising extreme positions. Using data from the British Election Study, this paper offers a quantitative test of this approach, finding an inconsistent relationship between social media use and extreme political opinions. Potential explanations for this are discussed alongside possible directions for future research.

Do discussions in like-minded groups necessarily lead to more extreme opinions? Deliberative democracy and group polarization

In today’s society, we can easily connect with people who share our ideas and interests. A problem with this development is that political reasoning in like-minded groups easily becomes lop-sided since there is little reason to critically examine information that everyone seems to agree with. Hence, there is a tendency for groups to become more extreme than the initial inclination of its members. We designed an experiment to test whether introducing deliberative norms in like-minded discussions can alleviate such group polarization. Based on their attitudes toward a linguistic minority, participants were divided into a positive and a negative opinion enclave. Within the two enclaves, the participants were randomly assigned to group discussions either with or without deliberative norms. Both face-to-face and online discussions were arranged. We found that free discussion without rules led to group polarization in like-minded groups, whereas polarization could be avoided in groups with deliberative norms.

How exposure to different opinions impacts the life cycle of social media

As a lot of communication and media consumption moves online, people may be exposed to a wider population and more diverse opinions. However, individuals may act differently when faced with opinions far removed from their own. Moreover, changes in the frequency of visits, posting, and other forms of expression could lead to narrowing of the opinions that each person observes, as well as changes in the customer base for online platforms. Despite increasing research on the rise and fall of online social media outlets, user activity in response to exposure to others’ opinions has received little attention. In this study, we first introduce a method that maps opinions of individuals and their generated content on a multi-dimensional space by factorizing an individual–object interaction (e.g., user-news rating) matrix. Using data on 6151 users interacting with 287,327 pieces of content over 21 months on a social media platform we estimate changes in individuals’ activities in response to interaction with content expressing a variety of opinions. We find that individuals increase their online activities when interacting with content close to their own opinions, and interacting with extreme opinions may decrease their activities. Finally, developing an agent-based simulation model, we study the effect of the estimated mechanisms on the future success of a simulated platform.

Conventional Views and Asset Prices: What to Expect After Times of Extreme Opinions?

This study evaluates the performance of stock market indices after times of extreme opinions. The underlying conjecture is that extreme opinions are associated to overreactions in the perception of wealth. The analysis covers 34 countries from 1988 through 2013. In a novel approach, views regarding economic performance are approximated using content in the global economic press. Consistent with the overreaction conjecture, stock market indices are shown to under-perform following extreme optimistic views and over-perform after pessimistic views. A long-short contrarian portfolio earns 11% annually over the next five years. This persistent and predictable difference in returns cannot be explained by risk considerations and cannot be replicated using alternative strategies based on past returns or past economic growth.

Aggregation and consensus for preference relations based on fuzzy partial orders

We propose a framework for eliciting and aggregating pairwise preference relations based on the assumption of an underlying fuzzy partial order. We also propose some linear programming optimization methods for ensuring consistency either as part of the aggregation phase or as a pre- or post-processing task. We contend that this framework of pairwise-preference relations, based on the Kemeny distance, can be less sensitive to extreme or biased opinions and is also less complex to elicit from experts. We provide some examples and outline their relevant properties and associated concepts.

Post-visit and pre-visit tourist destination image through eWOM sentiment analysis and perceived helpfulness

Purpose This paper aims to explore the image of travel destinations after the visit by analysing sentiment orientation of the online reviews, and how this orientation, as well as other electronic word of mouth (eWOM)’s credibility sources, can affect the perceived helpfulness of shared opinions measured through the helpfulness score. Design/methodology/approach Tourist destinations are increasingly affected by travel-related information shared through the Web. More and more people first check the previous travel experiences of other people to build their own destination image and to help them in their choice of destination. This paper analyses the shared opinions related to the city of Barcelona in a well-known eWOM website. The reviewers’ opinion and the credibility sources of eWOM are extracted from the web using a webscraper, while the sentiment score to analyse the discourse orientation (positive vs negative) is calculated using computer-based sentiment analysis techniques. Findings Online reviews’ users are reluctant to provide extreme polar opinions (very negative, very positive) to any travel subcategory (hotel, restaurant, attractions and night-life) of a tourist destination. The results obtained also reveal that eWOM’s perceived helpfulness grows with the expertise of the reviewer. However, the helpfulness score given to the reviews posted is not influenced by the sentiment orientation of the author’s opinion. Research limitations/implications This research is limited to the case study of Ciao, which is a well-known consumer platform, and the city of Barcelona, which is a top touristic destination. However, the approach proposed can be easily extended to other similar consumer platforms and cities using the same methodology. Practical implications Understanding the information posted in the media environment is a major concern in the field of marketing destination planning. Positive and negative eWOM offers potential consumers a clear picture on the tourist destination, and this information can be used by Destination Marketing Organisations to meet customers’ needs and expectations. The perceived helpfulness of reviews analysed in this paper can also help practitioners and scholars to understand those factors that make reviews more trustable. Originality/value From a methodological point of view, the main contribution of this research is the utilisation of an unstructured approach to the measurement of the destination image based on the sentiment analysis of shared opinions. From a theoretical point of view, the study relates the post-visit destination image with the pre-visit image formation process, using the sentiment orientation of the former and the perceived helpfulness of the latter.

The Language of Extremity

Using the linguistic software Linguistic Inquiry Word Count, we analyzed transcripts of group discussions of whether the words “under God” should be in the Pledge of Allegiance. We hypothesized that members with an extreme opinion would use less complex language and more you pronouns than other members. Furthermore, extreme members would have less influence when they used you pronouns or more complex language consistent with the illusion of understanding. Extreme members were more confident and perceived themselves as more knowledgeable, but they did not use less complex language than other members. When extreme members did use complex language, they were less influential. Extreme members used more you pronouns and use of you pronouns reduced their influence in the group. Groups containing at least one extreme member had a much lower level of complexity in their discourse than groups without extreme members. Results are situated within research in integrative complexity, illusion of understanding, and attitude extremity.

Standing Out from the Crowd: The Real Effects of Outliers

This paper examines the real effects of outlier opinions in the context of extreme analyst optimism. We show that the arrival of an extremely optimistic forecast raises the optimism of peer analysts and generates stronger stock price reactions. Firms with more extreme outlier forecasts conduct more earnings management. Outlier forecasts are unlikely driven by private information or conflict of interest arising from brokerage firm’s investment banking incentive. Instead, career incentives are likely the cause for an analyst to voice extreme opinions.

Consequences of nonconformist behaviors in a continuous opinion model

.We investigate opinion formation in a kinetic exchange opinion model, where opinions are represented by numbers in the real interval [−1, 1] and agents are typified by the individual degree of conviction about the opinion that they support. Opinions evolve through pairwise interactions governed by competitive positive and negative couplings, that promote imitation and dissent, respectively. The model also contemplates another type of nonconformity such that agents can occasionally choose their opinions independently of the interactions with other agents. The steady states of the model as a function of the parameters that describe conviction, dissent and independence are analyzed, with particular emphasis on the emergence of extreme opinions. Then, we characterize the possible ordered and disordered phases and the occurrence or suppression of phase transitions that arise spontaneously due to the disorder introduced by the heterogeneity of the agents and/or their interactions.

Anti-European discourse and negative image of the European Union in the Serbian media

This paper presents the results of research on the representation of the process and actors of Europeanization in the Serbian media. The analysis included 243 texts sampled from 13 to 19 June 2016 in the online editions of the daily newspapers Danas, Informer, Politika and Blic. The Europeanisation in the paper was not observed just as a technical aspect of the process, it was rather widely perceived as a discursive practice used for explaining, describing and defining social and political activities. To determine the key mechanisms for creating the image of Europeanization and actors of that process, a method of critical discourse analysis is applied. Special attention was paid to the analysis of lexical constructs and metaphors used to describe the process of Europeanization. Since one of the goals of the paper was to determine to what extent the presentation of this process in the media discourse has changed in comparison with previous research from 2012, comparative analysis is used as a complementary method. The results show an increased Euro-skepticism in the media discourse and in the discourse of the actors of the process of Europeanization. The framework of the negative perceptions of the EU in the discourse of politicians and state officials is constituted by implicit and explicit constructs of unstable, fickle and irresponsible EU who threatens, orders, and humiliates. Extreme anti-European opinions towards Europe are expressed through the open hate speech and the banalization and spectacularization of the topic. Analysis of conceptual metaphors in the sample showed that the previously observed patterns of conceptualization of the European Union as a model to follow has not changed and that they are still present in the media discourse of Serbian media.

"History Of ‘corporate Social Responsibility‘ Concept "

With long-lasting debates, corporate social responsibility concept was from thebeginning a high-interest subject to all of the stakeholders of the companies: shareholders, publicopinion, employees and governments. Based on studies which demonstrates the sociallyresponsible companies have major financial and image-related benefits, we started researchingthe roots of the concept ‘corporate social responsibility‘. By using qualitative method,hermeneutic perspective, we chose the comprehensive approach of CSR developed by Goodpasteret al. (2005). We analyzed four sides out of five of the concept (economics contributions ofcompanies to society, contextual changing of companies‘ development and existence environment,Conceptual evolution and dimentions of CSR, perspective of theories in close connection withCSR) and we proposed a definition of what we belive is CSR. Analyzing the pros and cons ofaccepting the CSR model as stated nowadays, we concluded as follows: Without neglecting theimplicit social responsibility of companies towards others (like human beings) - by means of taxesand social charges imposed by law, and without fully accepting the extreme opinion that presentscorporations as entities that indirectly hold all the communities‘ political, social and economicpower, companies should strictly follow their economic goal, which implicitly fulfils all theadditional requirements imposed to companies by some stakeholders.

Opinion formation and bi-polarization with biased assimilation and homophily

An agent-based model incorporating biased assimilation is proposed in this paper to investigate opinion dynamics over a connected social network. The opinion of each agent is represented by a sequence of arguments, and it evolves through the interactions between agents. The probability that one agent chooses another to communicate depends on the similarity of their opinions. During every interaction, interacting agents exchange the argument randomly selected from the corresponding arguments sequence. Theoretical analysis reveals that this model results in consensus on either extreme positive opinion or extreme negative opinion, or generates bi-polarization. Numerical simulations are carried out to investigate the dynamics of the model over different networks. Results are obtained in terms of the effect of homophily, biased assimilation and network topology on opinion formation.

A Qualitative Study of Child Custody Evaluators’ Beliefs and Opinions

Practices in child custody evaluations have created controversy and debate among professionals. Semi-structured interviews of 10 highly experienced child custody evaluators were analyzed to gain an understanding of the evaluation process, changes in the field, and evaluators’ opinions and beliefs, especially concerning intimate partner violence (IPV) and parental alienation. Although a small qualitative sample, multiple evaluators had extreme beliefs and opinions about the prevalence of IPV in child custody cases, the belief that there is no such thing as parental alienation syndrome (PAS), and the need to differentiate between alienation and estrangement. Evaluators continue to value the ability of parents to co-parent as a top variable for making custody recommendations, seemingly regardless of alleged or substantiated IPV. Other concerning themes were identified and theoretical problem areas are discussed.

The dynamics of polarization and compromise in conflict situations: The interaction between cultural traits and majority–minority influence

ABSTRACTThe present study looks at the interplay between cultural traits (need for uniqueness [NFU] and naïve dialecticism) and situational pressure (majority–minority influence) in explaining decision-making behaviors, specifically choosing one option between two contradictory but equally convincing opinions. A total of 435 participants were recruited nationally both from the US and Korea to participate in an online experiment. Findings suggest that the NFU and disinclination toward ambivalence drive US Americans (Westerners) to move toward extreme opinions (polarize) more than Koreans (East Asians) in the majority condition, whereas naïve dialecticism and reluctance to stand out for the sake of harmony drive Koreans to merge into the middle (compromise) more than US Americans in the minority condition.