In September of last year, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas petitioned the United Nations for full membership in the world body. For many Palestinians this event was a potent and long-overdue symbol of their statehood, a cause for celebration. For many Jewish Israelis, the Palestinians' bid was a betrayal of the spirit of ongoing peace negotiations in the region. For many others around the world, it was just one more flash point in the seemingly endless and intractable conflict between Israel and Palestine.
The event sparked intense emotions, from righteous resentment to hateful rage, and these emotions did indeed threaten the halting peace negotiations. Some Israelis vowed to abandon the process altogether, while others demanded even more belligerent policies toward Palestinians. In this highly charged situation emotions trumped deliberation and reason.
But did it have to work this way? The emotional reaction was perhaps understandable given the long history of conflict between the two nations, but was there any way to diffuse the raw feelings and keep them from spilling over into the policy arena? This question is at the heart of a new study by psychological scientist Eran Halperin of the Interdisciplinary Center in Israel. Halperin and colleagues wondered if people in an emotionally charged situation might be capable of regulating their intense feelings and remaining cool-headed decision makers.
To explore this possibility in the laboratory, the scientists trained a group of Jewish Israelis in a technique called cognitive reappraisal. Reappraisal involves rethinking the meaning of a situation in order to alter the emotional response. The scientists showed all the volunteers a series of photos, chosen to spark anger, but some of the volunteers were taught to respond to these intense images like scientists: objectively, analytically, in a cold and detached manner. The others, the controls, received no instructions.
Then the scientists deliberately tried to provoke nationalistic anger. They put on a presentation, including pictures, text, and music, about Israel's disengagement from the Gaza Strip and the Palestinian response, including the launching of rockets, the election of Hamas, and the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier. They knew that this reminder would induce an outraged response, but they told those who had been trained in reappraisal techniques to apply them to these emotional events.
Afterward, they gauged all the subjects' levels of negative emotion, including anger, rage, hatred, and fear. They also quizzed the subjects on various issues of policy: Should Israel provide food and medication to Gaza residents, regardless of security threats? If a terrorist is identified in a building of civilians, should Israel bomb the building, even if it means killing the civilians? They wanted to see if there was a difference in how aggressive or conciliatory the trained and untrained volunteers were.
There was a big difference. Not only did the trained volunteers feel less anger toward Palestinians, but they were also more likely to endorse conciliatory policies and less likely to advocate aggression. The cognitive training diminished the intergroup anger that fuels aggressive attitudes and policies, leading to a deescalation of political conflict.
Political attitudes, especially those related to such an emotional conflict, are considered deep-rooted, rigid, and highly resistant to change. So these lab results are quite remarkable. But the scientists wanted to see if this attitude shift was lasting, and they also wanted to test the concept in the real world, using a real political provocation. They decided to use the Palestinian bid for U.N. recognition as that event.
It was no secret last summer that Mahmoud Abbas intended to petition the U.N. for statehood, so the scientists had time to plan their experiment to make use of the upcoming announcement. Six days before the event, they recruited a different group of Jewish Israelis and again trained only some of them in cognitive appraisal techniques. A week after the training (and two days after the Palestinian petition to the U.N.), the scientists assessed their emotional and political reactions to the event. They assessed them again five months later. In addition to taking an emotional inventory, the volunteers answered such questions as, "If the Palestinians withdraw their U.N. bid, should Israel cede more territory in the West Bank?" and, "If Palestinians begin to march to Jerusalem, should Israeli forces use ammunition to stop them?" and so forth. As before, they were comparing the trained and untrained volunteers on conciliatory and belligerent attitudes.
The results, to be published in a forthcoming issue of the journal Psychological Science, were unambiguous. Immediately after the U.N. bid, those trained in reappraisal expressed less negative feelings toward Palestinians. They were more conciliatory in their policy positions, and much less likely to advocate hostile action. These emotions, and the peaceful policy positions they led to, endured even five months after the heat of the event.
Halperin and his colleagues consider their findings preliminary but provocative. Political positions in conflict situations are believed to be driven by ideology rather than emotion, and to be entrenched. These hopeful findings suggest that there may be interventions that incorporate cognitive reappraisal to deflate negative emotions, alter aggressive intentions, and boost support for peace.
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(I know, I know, a girl can dream :).
Would a more conciliatory approach yield that reaction from the other side? Or would it be perceived as weakness and invite more aggression?
Look at it from a purely Israeli or Palestinian angle and you miss the greater and vastly more important point: there are ways to evoke a more rational response when the first reaction is to rip some heads off. That can't be a bad thing.
This training sounds like a good idea to me! What could go wrong?
Most entertaining! :-)
This speaks to the basic bizzare factor of this whole issue.... WHY is Israel not OK to provide Justice to ALL of her people???
The hidden premise is that conciliatory measures are good. That is not necessarily the case.
The author used Israeli subjects. Nowhere does he say this is uniquely for Israelis to get over themselves or that there are cultural specifics that mean they need it more (or less) than anyone else.
It's a study in the mechanics of conflict. It's by far the most interesting thing I've read on HP in a long time.
It may work in theory. Not sure how it actually is implemented.
Such a move, the author should know, was not only a move that was contrary to the spirit of the peace process that commenced in Madrid in 1991; it was also contrary to the bilateral agreement of September 1995 reached and signed by the parties: Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).
Worse, this move was contrary to the relevant international law which is related to the Arab Israeli conflict and the very Security Council Resolution of the UN, No. 242, that has been the very basis for All talks between Israel and its Arab neighbors, local and regional.
And, since the PLO, by definition, can't reach peace with Israel through the normal channels to which it has committed, it is high time the international community, along with the local players, resorted to direct application of the relevant elements of international law related to the conflict, i.e. San Remo Conference decisions, 1920; League of Nations decisions, 1922; United Nations Charter, Article 80, 1945; and, UN Security Council Resolution, 242, 1967.
P.S. Note, 242 doesn't call for the setting up of an additional state between the Jordan River and the Med. Sea, nor does it even mention concepts such as "Palestinians" or a "Palestinian state"!!!!!
And it is not humane to continue the oppression of people in order to steal their land.
There is no rationalization of excuse for the mistreatment of people, and Jehudah should be wise enough to know that.
"Never Forget, Never Again" is most powerful when it applies to EVERYONE not just YOUR favorites.....
And this has what(?) to do with this article?
Attention "fullofmitt" this article suggests that less emotion and more logic are much more constructive.
The majority of people living in Jordan are Palestinians.
That's where most of them are.
http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=265740