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Political advertisements can shift attitudes and behaviors to become more exclusionary toward social out-groups. However, people who engage in an antidiscrimination exercise in the context of an experiment may respond differently to such ads. What interventions might foster inclusive attitudes in the presence of political communications about social policy issues like transgender rights? We examined two scalable antidiscrimination exercises commonly used in applied settings: describing a personal narrative of discrimination and perspective-taking. We then showed people political ads that are favorable or opposed to transgender rights to determine whether those interventions moderate how receptive people are to the messages. Relying on two demographically representative survey experiments of adults in the United States (study 1 N = 1,291; study 2 N = 1,587), we found that personal recollections of discriminatory experiences did not reduce exclusionary attitudes, but perspective-taking had some effects, particularly among those who fully complied with the exercise. However, both studies revealed potential backfire effects; recalling a discriminatory experience induced negative attitudes among a subset of the participants, and participants who refused to perspective-take when prompted also held more negative attitudes. Importantly, political ads favorable toward transgender rights consistently resulted in more positive attitudes toward transgender people. Future work needs to carefully examine heterogeneous responses and resistance to antidiscrimination interventions and examine what particular aspects of the political ads induced the attitude change.

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RATIONALE: Although obesity represents a potential public health crisis, our understanding of public perceptions of obesity, emotional responses to the obese, and related policy preferences is limited. OBJECTIVE: We employed Weiner's attribution theory of controllability (Weiner, 1988, 2011) to examine perceived causes of obesity, emotional responses, and related policy implications. If the perceived cause is controllable (eating and lifestyle habits), we expected less sympathy and greater anger toward obese people and support for prejudicial hiring policies based on weight. If the cause is perceived as uncontrollable (genetic), sympathy is anticipated as well as opposition to such hiring policies. METHOD: We conducted multivariate analyses with data from two nationally representative surveys of U.S. adults. CONCLUSION: Our findings supported the hypotheses, showing that sympathy and lack of anger toward obese people are strongly determined by a genetic attribution for obesity. Moreover, sympathy and the genetic attribution are significant predictors of opposition to hiring policies that discriminate against obese people. Finally, in a second study, chief among several causal attributions for obesity-lack of will power, lack of exercise, marketing of foods, and genetics-we discovered biological attribution functions as the key predictor of perceptions that obese people are frequent targets of discrimination. We suggest governments and the food industry should be more attuned to the underlying beliefs of the public about the causes of obesity when formulating programs and policies to address the issue.

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Civil unrest and riots in the U.S. engender considerable attention. Much of the civil unrest from the 1960s, and recent incidents, likely result from many factors, including poverty, police practices, and negative motivations of some unrest participants. However, not all observers view these events from the same perspective. We contend that individuals often interpret events through social identities, such as race and partisanship, and thus causal attributions for unrest differ widely. We employ data from three recent national surveys and examine individual interpretations of the causal forces leading to these events. Our analyses suggest that racial and political identities provide a powerful lens through which individuals come to attribute causes for civil unrest. Conflicting narratives over causes likely hinders attempts to provide solutions and reduces the likelihood of future unrest that can lead to violence.

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Existing literature on numeracy suggests that people are likely to perceive outgroups as larger if the group is perceived as threatening. However, some studies also suggest that numeracy is a function of wishful thinking or even a lack of political knowledge. We engage the literature on numeracy of the gay and lesbian population by employing data from 1977 and 2013 surveys of American adults. We examine the factors that are associated with estimating the gay population. Next we explore how innumeracy may shape attitudes about homosexuality and gay rights. Our findings suggest that estimates of the gay population are partly a function of knowledge, and perhaps wishful thinking, but not threat. However, our analysis also reveals that higher estimates of the gay population are associated with less support for gay civil rights in the current era and were not a factor in the past.

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As a political issue, death and dying topics only sometimes reach the political agenda. However, some issues, such as physician-assisted suicide (PAS) have been highly salient. This article explores attitudes toward PAS by examining the malleability of opinion when respondents are exposed to issue frames and when specific messengers present those frames. We used 4 experimental conditions in a statewide survey and 1 control group, which allowed us to compare the impact of a framed message on opinion as well as that message presented by a specific messenger. Results suggest that support for PAS can be shaped by whether PAS is framed as individual choice or as a matter involving sanctity of life. In addition, we find that specific messengers did not influence opinion on PAS beyond the influence of the issue frame itself, controlling for respondent characteristics such as gender and race. Indeed, the findings indicate that messengers may in fact reduce the intended impact of issue frames of opinion toward PAS.

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