2024/11/28 by Daniel Jolley, Jenny L. Paterson, Jennifer Paterson +3
Computer Science · Social Sciences · #Hate Speech and Cyberbullying Detection #Misinformation and Its Impacts #Social Media and Politics
paper · pdf · doi:10.1002/casp.70020
openalex publication_date 2024/11/28 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
ABSTRACT As harmful conspiracy beliefs against transgender people are becoming increasingly popular, three experiments examined how cisgender people's contact with transgender individuals might reduce these beliefs. In Study 1a ( N = 222), positive parasocial contact with transgender creators on TikTok (vs. no contact) was found to increase perspective‐taking, which was associated with lower transgender conspiracy beliefs when controlling for frequency of contact and prejudice. Study 1b ( N = 302) replicated this effect when controlling for frequency of contact. Study 2 ( N = 220) aimed to manipulate perspective‐taking. Contrary to predictions, asking participants to actively perspective‐take (vs. no perspective‐taking) did not increase perspective‐taking (manipulation check) or reduce conspiracy beliefs. However, as all the studies measured participants’ frequency of positive and negative contact with transgender people, we pooled the data to explore whether these forms of contact were also linked with perspective‐taking and conspiracy beliefs (combined N = 743). A positive relationship between frequency of positive contact with transgender people and perspective‐taking was found, which was then associated with lower transgender conspiracy beliefs when controlling for prejudice and experimental conditions. Our findings underscore the potential of positive contact, including via TikTok, to foster perspective‐taking, which may mitigate conspiracy beliefs against transgender people.