CBB Seminar | Social Seminar ~ Federico Zimmerman, Harvard

CBB Seminar ~ Location, CGIS South S010 Tsai Auditorium - Concourse Level 

Federico Zimmerman, Postdoctoral Fellow, Goldenberg Lab, Harvard Business School

Title ~ Coherence and extremity as drivers of network segregation

Political segregation and affective polarization pose pressing challenges to democratic societies. While homophily, the tendency to prefer similar others, has been seen as the main driver of segregation, my research shows that social preferences also include an asymmetric attraction to coherent and extreme ingroup members. Drawing on experimental and observational studies, I show that the attraction to coherent and extreme ingroup members appears across diverse countries and contexts. For example, more extreme copartisans are more likely to be followed on social media and are seen as more accurate and useful sources of information. Moreover, the preference for extreme ingroup members is associated with higher levels of outgroup animosity, suggesting that it may be a significant driver of polarization. Taken together, these findings reveal that asymmetric social preferences beyond homophily play a crucial role in structuring networks, fueling segregation, and reinforcing polarization.