Keys to revealing disguised racist discourse according to science

Although many anti-racist social movements have arisen in recent years, the truth is that they were formed precisely because of this, because racism does not stop, does not stop, and does not disappear.

According to research published in Journal of Language and Social Psychology, sRacists do not live on the fringes of society, so on many occasions they try to shop and be more conservative in their speeches.not just to face others, but to get a better image of themselves.

But the study by David Markowitz, a communications researcher at the University of Oregon, revealed that you can see what They hide their speeches through language.

“People lie for a reason, especially when the truth is an issue or when they want to maintain a good reputation,” the researcher explains.

In a large online experiment, Markowitz asked 1,169 volunteers in the United States to rate from 0 to 100 the progression of 8 different social groups: Arabs, Muslims, immigrants, Americans, Democrats, Republicans, African Americans, and Asians.

The survey was already biased, as these people were asked to answer to see if they were more humanAnd the More understanding and open, or not.

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We asked to better understand language differences Half of the respondents who lied The other half said they were completely honest when they wrote about their feelings for these social groups.

Once you get the answers, the text analysis software, linguistic inquiry and word count, He was able to distinguish between sincere and insincere responses, depending on the types words used.

Markowitz explains that the program was really important to the investigation, he reveals psychological aspects From communicators who have a different view of what they really express.

For example, the group who lied did not use many references to themselves and showed it More negative feelings of people who were sincere in their speeches, except for those who had very negative (real) views of the social group they were talking about.

“The personal belief that a social group is less human, which is expressed in such a way that it can fit a larger discourse to make a good impression, is associated with a greater number of Express negative feelings of those who speak truthfully,” Markowitz explains Sciences.

People who lie seem to underestimate the amount of supportive language they need to appear honest. This arithmetic error has also been previously observed in other situations.

For example, a scientific fraud analysis of psychiatrist Diederik Stapel (he was suspended from his job for lying in his articles) ensures that when the articles were fraudulent, he used Lots of scientific terms To back up your speech, compare to your honest articles.

Returning to Markowitz’s study, it was found that this exaggeration of language was more pronounced in volunteers They lied about groups they considered more progressive. Partly, according to the author, because they will feel more uncomfortable talking about the social groups close to them.

More research is still needed to test the limitations of the study and ensure the reliability of this method, but Markowitz strives to better understand these processes as they may help Mitigating Persuasive Hate SpeechAlways avoid harming minorities.

“We can do a good job of uncovering these persuasive ideologies in language, and this is one of the first studies of its kind to suggest Specific word patterns reveal these psychological processes.