A recent study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that hostility toward refugees increased in an online forum following two terrorist attacks in Germany. When social norms suggested a non-acceptance of hate speech, however, this rise in hostility was attenuated.
Study authors Amalia Álvarez-Benjumea and Fabian Winter argue that social norms — accepted rules of behavior among a given group — tend to keep outward expressions of anger and violence at bay. Terrorist attacks, however, tend to provoke an onslaught of negativity and prejudice toward outgroups, particularly when the prosecutors of such attacks are members of a visible minority.
“In 2015 and 2016 there was an increase in the number of terrorist attacks in Germany, and Europe in general, attributed to Islamist terrorists,” Amalia Álvarez-Benjumea told PsyPost.
“Hatred often follows terrorist attacks, particularly when the attacker is characterized as a member of a social or religious minority. We wanted to test how the attacks were affecting social norms with regard to the expression of prejudice in online settings.”
To study this, the researchers created an online forum and invited 274 German residents to participate. The subjects were shown various photographs depicting one of two social topics — refugees or gender rights. Participants were asked to leave a comment below the discussion threads accompanying each image.
To manipulate the role of social norms on the forum, the researchers created three different conditions. In the no-norm condition, subjects saw discussion threads with comments ranging from positive to hostile. In this condition, it was unclear whether hate speech was accepted among the group or not. In the weak-norm condition, no hostile comments were shown in the discussion threads, suggesting a social norm that went against hate speech. In the strong-norm condition, only very positive comments were shown — further reinforcing the non-acceptance of hate speech.
Importantly, the study took place around the time that two terrorist attacks took place in Würzburg and Ansbach in July 2016, attacks which were later claimed by the Islamic State. Roughly half the sample was recruited prior to the two terrorist attacks and the other half was recruited after the attacks, allowing researchers to examine whether hate speech had increased following the attacks.
The researchers found that while hate speech directed toward refugees increased following the terrorist attacks, hostility toward other groups (concerning gender rights) did not — suggesting that the Islamist terrorist attacks were responsible for the increased hostility toward refugees.
When the researchers compared the results from the study’s three conditions, an interesting finding emerged. Only in the no-norm condition — when the discussion boards were free of norms regulating hate speech — did hostile comments toward refugees increase after the attacks. When the discussion boards were absent of hostile comments, exemplifying a norm against hate (weak-norm condition), or only contained positive comments (strong-norm condition) hate speech did not get worse after the attacks.
What’s more, this effect appeared to be strongest for the comments that were the most hostile. In the no-norm condition, the very hostile comments experienced a greater jump in severity after the attacks than the less hostile comments, suggesting that terrorist attacks “radicalize the already hateful comments” while only slightly affecting the positive or middle-ground comments.
“The effect of terrorist attacks on online xenophobia is highly dependent on the local context and the social norms. Prejudiced attitudes are likely to be voiced only if the perceived social acceptability of expressing prejudice increases. Norms against hate speech thus act as a bulwark that prevents extremely prejudiced opinions from being voiced,” Álvarez-Benjumea told PsyPost.
The researchers take these findings as evidence that social norms effectively dictate whether or not prejudice attitudes will be expressed following a terrorist attack. “Descriptive norms against hate speech thus act as a bulwark that prevents extremely prejudiced opinions from being voiced,” Álvarez-Benjumea and Winter discuss. “On the positive side, the vast majority of people would not be converted into spreaders of hate, just because others do so. However, it also suggests that those who already hold negative beliefs about minorities seem to be encouraged to paint an even darker picture of immigration in Western societies.”
But the study — like all research — includes some caveats.
“Our study paints a simplified picture of an online community in which participants do not know each other and interact only once. We do not know how the effect would be in closer online communities where users are not anonymous. Furthermore, different individuals may react differently. I am thinking of internet trolls or other instigators of prejudiced behavior,” Álvarez-Benjumea explained.
The study, “The breakdown of antiracist norms: A natural experiment on hate speech after terrorist attacks”, was authored by Amalia Álvarez-Benjumea and Fabian Winter.
