Experimental Design
This additional survey extends our previous experiments, pre-registered under AEARCTR-0016004. Israeli participants from different political groups will evaluate a random subset of social and political issues from the previous experiments. For example, one item asks, "What percentage of control should the coalition have in the Judicial Selection Committee?" For each issue, participants will rate the extent to which they perceive it as: (1) important, (2) an issue where expressing an unpopular opinion is likely to attract criticism, (3) politically controversial in Israel, and (4) one they are knowledgeable about.
We will use within-group ratings to analyze results from the previous experiments, which examine how the social identity mechanism of outgroup differentiation facilitates dissent and how the group reinforces it. Building on our prior pre-registration, we will examine whether these effects are amplified for issues seen as more important, more likely to attract criticism for expressing unpopular opinions, or more politically controversial. We will also examine the mediating role of social learning by exploring whether lower perceived knowledge within a group is associated with greater openness to outgroup positions. Furthermore, we will analyze heterogeneity based on participants' strength of group identification.
Each participant will also complete a brief set of questions, including psychological measures of identity, demographics, and feedback to the researchers. They will also rate their perceived similarity to each group and assess the overall strength of identification within their group. We will examine how individuals' group identification relates to their perceived similarity to their ingroup and outgroup. Additionally, we will examine whether stronger group identification is linked to the belief that other group members also identify more strongly with it. Finally, we will explore how ratings vary across demographic characteristics.
Randomization is done at the participant level and includes the selection and ordering of approximately half the political issues to be rated (10 out of 21), the order of rating dimensions (importance, anticipated criticism, political controversy, and knowledge), and the presentation order of political groups in the concluding questions.