Why is it so hard to change your mind?

“The most difficult subjects,” the novelist Leo Tolstoy once wrote, “can be explained to the slowest-minded man if he does not already have an idea of ​​them; but the simplest things cannot be explained to the most intelligent man if he is firmly convinced that he already knows, beyond the shadow of a doubt, what is proposed to him. »

Until recently, I would have agreed. Much psychological research has suggested that many people are extraordinarily resistant to changing their opinions and that there is little we can do to remove their blinders. This, combined with the rise of social media, was thought to be behind the growing political polarization of the past two decades.

So you can imagine my joy at discovering a new article that offers reasons for optimism. According to Stephanie Dolbier of the University of California, Los Angeles and colleagues, psychologists have already discovered many techniques for opening our minds – and it all depends on our ability to resist emotional discomfort.

Like many psychological traits, open-mindedness naturally varies by population. You can measure this by rating your agreement with a series of statements, such as:

• People should consider evidence that runs counter to the conclusions they favor.
• When faced with a confusing question, we should try to consider several possible answers before reaching a conclusion.

And:

• Changing your mind is a sign of weakness

As expected, people who strongly agree with the first two statements and strongly disagree with the third are considered more open-minded than those who think it is best to settle for just one point of view without considering other options or updating their opinions based on new evidence.

Active, open-minded thinking has many benefits. Philip Tetlock of the University of Pennsylvania and his colleagues, for example, found that it improves people’s ability to predict the outcome of geopolitical events. Over the course of a two-year competition involving more than 700 participants, he found that the top performers – whom he dubbed “superforecasters” – were far more willing to change their minds in the face of new evidence than the average person. Such mental flexibility can also protect us from irrational beliefs, such as conspiracy theories, which typically rely on people’s tendency to jump to conclusions about how the world works.

However, for most of us, being open-minded is often easier said than done. At the very least, we may feel some discomfort in admitting that our judgment was wrong in the past, so we cling to our old opinions to avoid losing face. Worse yet, our beliefs are often tied to core elements of our identity, such as our religion or political identity, in a complex tapestry. Loosen one of these knots and you may feel like our entire sense of self is about to unravel, which can be a terrifying prospect.

To protect our ego, the brain therefore engages in “motivated reasoning,” which involves searching for justifications to reinforce our fundamental assumptions, even if it relies on logical fallacies and misinformation or leads us to lash out at people who question us.

Maintaining an open mind, then, requires considerable strength to resist this mental discomfort – and it can start with greater emotional awareness. Dolbier and colleagues cite 2019 research on “wise reasoning,” for example. It found that people who offer more nuanced descriptions of their emotions are better able to consider different perspectives than those who simply label their mood as “good” or “bad.”

That makes sense. If I have high emotional awareness, I might recognize that I am not so much angry at another person’s stupidity for not seeing something from my point of view, but frustrated by my own inarticulability in trying to get an idea across to them, and afraid of appearing stupid myself. This realization might then encourage me to consider my argument more critically – and possibly change my mind. In other words, maybe they’re not wrong, but I’m letting my emotions keep me from finding out.

The role of emotional awareness could explain why mindfulness helps some people reason more rationally. By paying attention to their inner climate, they are better equipped to recognize and avoid typical knee-jerk reactions to others’ viewpoints, thereby forming more balanced opinions.

If meditation isn’t your thing, we could consider a little role play. In one study, people were taught to behave internally and respond to upsetting events “like scientists, in an objective and analytical way.” After this training, they tended to be more open-minded about some of the more polarizing topics, like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Quite remarkably, follow-up experiments showed that the benefits of this short intervention lasted at least five months after the initial test.

Alternatively, we can place the point of disagreement in the broader context of our lives. In the heat of disagreement, we often forget that we are multifaceted beings with many values ​​and talents, and think that our entire self-worth depends on proving that we are right on this one point. Briefly describing one of these other qualities to ourselves – whether it’s our loyalty to our friends, our creativity, or our sense of humor – can therefore reduce the feeling of threat when we are faced with a difference of opinion. This only seems to work, however, if someone is already aware of their own potential for bias based on their existing beliefs, which again highlights the importance of self-awareness.

Finally, we can reframe difficult feelings as a sign of growth. Experiments have shown that simply reminding people of their cognitive capacity can encourage them to respond more constructively to people with opposing viewpoints. With this mindset, we can view our mistakes as learning opportunities, making it easier for us to accept that our previous views may have been wrong.

Dolbier and colleagues point out that many of these techniques need to be tested more thoroughly in a wider variety of contexts, and that many more could emerge along the way. But the existing research at least offers a starting point — and I’ll definitely put some of these strategies into practice myself the next time my beliefs are challenged.

David Robson’s latest book is The Laws of Connection: 13 Social Strategies That Will Transform Your Life. If you have a question you would like answered in his column, please message him at davidrobson.me/contact.