Bo Brusco | February 27, 2021 (10-minute read)

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It is hardly a secret that America has fallen ill with a severe case of extreme political tribalism in recent years. This polarization is seemingly political on its surface, but on a deeper level, it is also a sociopsychological issue. While it is easy to diagnose the nation with this ailment, prescribing a treatment for it is a more complicated matter. Dr. Robert Wright, professor of Psychology at Brigham Young University - Idaho, volunteers his expertise in dissecting the current predicament and suggests a potential remedy as well.

Tribalism In America

“United we stand, divided we fall” has been the American motto since before the country’s founding. John Dickinson penned the lyrics in 1768 for a pre-Revolutionary War tune called “The Liberty Song.” Now, 253 years later, Americans are struggling to uphold this unifying ideal.

In 2019, Pew Research published an article detailing how extreme political tribalism has become, stating that “Partisanship continues to be the dividing line in the American public’s political attitudes, far surpassing differences by age, race and ethnicity, gender, educational attainment, religious affiliation or other factors.” Such divisions are counter-productive and contrary to the country’s motto. While many news outlets have raised awareness of the issue (like a USA Today article from 2019 titled “Divided we fall?”), more serious contemplation towards a solution is required if we hope to overcome extreme division and avoid the warning foretold in the latter half of the mentioned mantra.

The Psychology of Tribalism

“When you're part of a group, you feel like you’re connected. You’ve got a social support system. You’ve got a social structure. You’re not alone,” says Dr. Robert Wright of the Department of Psychology at Brigham Young University - Idaho, while detailing the essential psychological components of tribalism.

Dr. Wright earned an M.S. in Social and Occupational Health Psychology from Portland State University, and later, a Ph.D. in Social and Occupational Health Psychology from the same university in 2012. He has been a professor of Psychology in Rexburg, Idaho, for more than eight years now.

Continuing to describe the psychology behind tribalism, Dr. Wright says that “The biggest thing is identity.” Noting that tribalism isn’t inherently bad, he explains one of its most significant benefits and, subsequently, one of its most compelling appeals to humankind. “Everybody is trying to figure out who they are, what they stand for, where they’re going,” he explains, “And one nice thing about being part of a group — a group membership or a member of a tribe as it were; tribalism — is that you have a sense of identity.” Further highlighting the point, Dr. Wright says, “the fantastic thing about this — and I use that word not lightly, I mean it is truly unique in many ways to us humans — is that it offers a group identity.”

“We are social beings,” Dr. Wright continues, “we simply do not do well when we don’t have a group that we feel that we belong to. So I’d say that’s a key psychological component right there.” Though social tribalism plays a vital role in human psychology, when it reaches extremes, it leads to the sort of stark divisions we are experiencing now.

Extreme Tribalism

But how can we identify when tribalism has reached unhealthy extremes or has gone awry? Dr. Wright explains that “In social psychology, we grow concerned about a particular phenomenon we’ve seen a number of times called ‘groupthink,’ and that is where we surround ourselves with people who make us feel good. It’s natural.”

Psychology Today defines groupthink as “a phenomenon that occurs when a group of well-intentioned people makes irrational or non-optimal decisions spurred by the urge to conform or the belief that dissent is impossible.”

Dr. Wright also warns that confirmation bias will likely accompany groupthink wherever it occurs, saying that groupthink brings individuals “into the realm of confirmation bias — where we are only looking — you may not even be aware of doing it — but you tend to look for only the facts that support your own held biases.” Such psychological behavior could prove problematic when trying to reason with others outside of one’s group.

Explaining further, Dr. Wright says, “And so what happens when you get a lot of people who are like-minded into a group? It’s great for group cohesion and solidifying the group; however, it can lead to extreme behaviors.” Pulling examples from history, Dr. Wright mentioned Nazism as one of the prime incidents of the extreme behaviors that erupted from the groupthink phenomenon. Though he admits there are plenty of other examples, Nazism is by far the most salient one.

In order to avoid groupthink, Dr. Wright suggests that we do all we can to allow a variety of opinions into whatever tribe we belong to, saying, “Disagreement, and arguing even, or differences of opinions, can be uncomfortable, but they are necessary to keep us from going into the errors that come with groupthink.”

Ever aware of the nature of the human psyche, Dr. Wright admits that this is easier said than done, stating that “it goes against our natural inclinations to have people who disagree with us be around us often.” He also notes that participants of groupthink are often unaware of its occurrence, explaining that “by virtue of that groupthink phenomenon, you don’t know that you’re a victim of it at the time.” That being the case, injecting a variety of opinions into different groups may not be a feasible cure-all to America’s extreme tribalistic state.

A Potential Treatment for Extreme Polarization: The Robber’s Cave Experiment

So what treatment would Dr. Wright prescribe that could cure this current case of extreme tribalism? The answer may lie in a psychological experiment conducted in 1950’s, referred to as the “Robber’s Cave Experiment.” The experiment was conducted at an isolated summer camp and involved a number of boys who all shared similar backgrounds: white, 11 to 12 years of age, and from Protestant, Middle-Class backgrounds. The boys did not know each other before the experiment began, and upon arriving at the campsite, they were divided into two groups: The Rattlers and the Eagles. And this is where the trouble began.

Within these two groups, the boys established social order as they discovered roles for themselves to fill, some even becoming the leaders of their respective group. To cite the publication of the study directly: “Each group developed its own jargon, special jokes, secrets and special ways of performing tasks” (Sherif, 1956, p. 56). When pitted against one another, whether it be a game of tug-o-war or a treasure hunt, the groups began demonstrating prejudice towards each other. The language of each group changed too. They began referring to the opposing group in a demeaning way, calling the others “stinkers,” “sneaks,” and “cheaters” (Sherif, 1956, p. 57).

Attempting to bring the conflicting groups into harmony with each other, the conductors of the experiment placed the two together in social situations; however, they quickly found that “far from reducing conflict, these situations only served as opportunities for the rival groups to berate and attack each other” (Sherif, 1956, p. 57). It was clear that forcing the two tribes into the same room would not result in harmony. So what was it that finally eased the tensions between these two groups and ultimately cured the extreme sense of tribalism afoot?

“What they found was that when they had goals that both of the groups had to work together to achieve — called a ‘superordinate goal’ — then it brought the groups together. Mere contact was not enough,” explains Dr. Wright, “What must happen is that it must be seen by both groups that you need the other group to help you with your goal.” Elaborating further, Dr. Wright suggests it is even more advantageous for groups to begin to think in terms of “we need each other for our goal to be met.”

A Superordinate Goal

The difficult question to answer, then, is what will be the superordinate goal that could eventually ease the extreme divisions between political tribes in America? Admittedly, Dr. Wright doesn’t have an answer for that, “especially with how large of a country we have and how diverse of a country we have,” he explains.

Dr. Wright did, however, have an example of a superordinate goal that helped unify Americans about 80 years ago: Pearl Harbor. “It unified our country beyond anything else it could have done. We all had to work together. Men and women — again, there’s two groups right there — had to work together. Black and whites had to work together. Republicans and Democrats had to work together,” he continues, “and it’s too bad it was a war that had to unify us. But it unified us in a way that maybe nothing else could have, at least at that time.”

History agrees with Dr. Wright in that the bombing of Pearl Harbor did unite our country. In fact, the Washington Post published a piece in 2016 titled “The attack on Pearl Harbor united Americans like no other event in our history.” The Post also published an article last year about how 9/11 had a similar, though brief, effect. But will it take yet another destructive act of war for America’s political tribes to finally reach some sense of unity or harmony?

What Can Be Done Today?

Dr. Wright’s prescription is simple: “We need something where we can all see that we all need each other to meet our goal.” One would think that the nation has been given many challenges, just within the past year, that could have functioned as superordinate goals. Between the pandemic and the civil unrest, it is difficult not to wonder how it has gotten to the point where these significantly tumultuous times have failed to unify the political parties.

Until the masses can identify such a goal, Dr. Wright advises that we do what we can to avoid groupthink. Additionally, he urges Americans to consider thinking before responding harshly to other political groups’ speech and behavior. “One last thing I’d say,” he concludes, “is to be aware, don’t just act. It’s a very difficult skill to learn. But before you do something, think, ‘Why am I doing this? Why do I feel the need to attack this person’s opinion?’ And if you can stop and think just for a little bit, and analyze why you’re behaving the way you are, boy, I think we can come a long ways.”

The Robber’s Cave Experiment Reference:

Sherif, M. (1956). Experiments in group conflict. Scientific American, 195(5), 54-59.

The Psychology of America’s Extreme Political Tribalism