Hating an Outgroup is to Render their Stories a Fiction: A BLINCS Model Hypothesis and Commentary

Abstract

The underpinnings of intergroup dynamics, particularly in relation to outgroup antipathy, have been systematically examined from psychological and sociocultural perspectives. In this paper, I make a case for the added consideration of imagination-based factors in our explanations of the foundations that give rise to outgroup-directed hate and discrimination. The proposal is an application of the BLINCS model, which holds that our implicit understanding of the reality-fiction distinction is rooted in the inherent features of fictional narratives, namely that they are bounded, inference-light, curated, and sparse. I propose that intergroup hate derives in part from our propensity to render the stories about our outgroups to be more akin to fiction than to reality.

Keywords

intergroup conflict storytelling narrative cognition narrative imagination reality-fiction interactions

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