2025/11/11 by Chen-Wei Yu, William J. Brady · 1 voice
Social Sciences · #Misinformation and Its Impacts #Social Media and Politics #Social and Intergroup Psychology
paper · doi:10.31234/osf.io/nfgwc_v1
openalex created_date 2025/11/11 · openalex publication_date 2025/11/11 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
Moral outrage spreads widely in online political discourse, but how do people understand others’ outrage expressions? Across three studies (N = 1,855), including behavioral experiments and a field study, we discovered that partisan-biased motive inferences underlie the divergent effects of online outrage expression: While people typically inferred that their in-partisans’ motives for expressing outrage were to raise awareness or inspire action, they tended to infer their political opponents’ motives were to shame or troll. These motive inferences were linked to greater political sectarianism and lower willingness to have a conversation about politics with the outrage expressor. In a fourth study (N = 720), we developed an intervention that changed people’s motive inferences, which improved willingness to have a conversation about politics. These findings highlight the role of motive inferences in shaping contemporary online political discourse filled with strong emotions, and suggest key levers to foster civil interactions among cross-partisans.