Institute Fellow: Religion, Arts, and Peacebuilding, Dr Jocelyn Dautel, has been awarded a further 2 years of funding ($260k) from the Templeton World Charity Foundation for a collaborative project on ‘Communicating ‘Truth:’ Consumption and transmission of polarized information amongst young people in a divided society’, which forms part of the Grand Challenges in Human Flourishing initiative.

The project will be conducted by an international and multidisciplinary team of researchers including:

• Mariah Kornbluh (University of Oregon)
• Jing Xu (University of Seattle Washington)
• Bethany Corbett (Ulster University)
• Lara Wood (Abertay University)
• Christin Schulz (University of Amsterdam)
• Jennifer Watling Neal (Michigan State University)
• Kathleen Corriveau (Boston University)
• Emma Flynn (Warwick University)

The team’s expertise stretches across the disciples of cognitive science, psychology, cultural evolution, anthropology, communications, nueroscience, and child and adolescent development.

Explaining the project, Jocelyn said:

“In this programme of research, we integrate paradigms from cultural evolution and social learning to investigate how young people evaluate the credibility of information in divided societies, including how they seek and share information. We use mixed-methods to investigate dynamic influences within broader socio-ecological systems, exploring interpersonal, structural and cultural influences on information transmission and belief revision amongst young people in Northern Ireland.

With seed funding from the Templeton World Charity Foundation our team embarked on an ambitious project including three strands of mixed-method research to pursue this programme of research. The current funding will allow us to finalize data collection, synthesize our results across three strands of research, and disseminate findings through academic outputs and community research engagement.

In Strand 1, we employ computational text-mining to examine how narratives on identity and polarisation affect social learning. Novel text analysis methods and utilization of Large Language Models (LLMs) allow for exploration of actual differences in information via pedagogical texts and cross-generational narratives that young people are exposed to in Northern Ireland.

In Strand 2, we employ diffusion chains, similar to an experimental game of telephone, to test biases in the transmission and consumption of polarised information across young people. In this method we feed a polarized narrative to a first participant, who reads and recalls for the next participant. The second participant then reads and recalls the narrative of the first participant, and recalls for a third participant, and so on. Experimental paradigms will allow us to rigorously test how information is transmitted across young people within- and between ethno-religious groups, and how aspects of transmission (e.g. content, source) impact fidelity of information across transmission and openness to belief revision.

Strand 3 uses qualitative interviews to elucidate the role of culture and social context, as well as thought processes around information consumption, transmission, and belief revision. Furthermore, qualitative interviews yield the opportunity to explore facilitators of belief revision across multiple ecological system levels: interpersonal (family, peers), structural (schools, neighbourhoods), and cultural (social media, politics).

Now in the final stages of data collection, we shift our focus with the current funding to analysis and dissemination of our research findings.  We will also synthesize findings across strands in order to illuminate biases in the consumption and transmission of information. The findings will inform future interventions focussed on increasing epistemic vigilance and critical consciousness of young people in polarized societies.”

To find out more, contact Jocelyn at jocelyn.dautel@qub.ac.uk