Among people fighting for racial justice, "virtue signaling" may sometimes be derided as empty action. "Virtue signals" are public messages of support for a social justice cause. They could take the form of a yard sign, a t-shirt, or a social media post. Critics sometimes argue that such messages are easy and cheap. It's easy for a company to put a message on their home page that supports Black Lives Matter. It's not hard to wear a t-shirt that supports a social justice cause. But are these expressions of support all talk and no action?
An article in Time magazine argues that virtue signaling can be more powerful than we think. The authors, psychological scientists Jamil Zaki and Mina Cikara, integrate several studies to make their argument. Here's part of their introduction:
It’s critical to question people whose most radical act is temporarily changing their profile picture. It’s critical they follow their words with action; the time for talk has passed. But focusing solely on virtue signalers obscures their most important role. Like radio waves, the signals they send are received by someone, and those receivers matter, too.
Zaki and Cikara argue that virtue signaling is an important way of influencing others. If a lot of people change their profile pictures to support BLM, for example, more people will start to believe that this movement is popular and they may adopt it, too:
Opinions can work this way: when a particular viewpoint gets a lot of attention, people assume it’s popular, and shift towards it. We receive signals, and are changed by them.
What studies support their argument? Here's one that the authors summarize:
As social norms shift, individuals shift with them: adopting popular opinions and behaviors, and dropping ones that fall out of style. Norms are especially powerful as they gain steam. In one set of studies, Gregg Sparkman and Greg Walton presented diners in a cafeteria [either] with evidence that 30% of the U.S. population was vegetarian, or that 30% of the population was newly vegetarian. People who learned about this second, “dynamic social norm” were twice as likely to order a meatless lunch themselves. They saw not just where the crowd was, but where it was going, and didn’t want to be left behind.
Here are some questions about the study summarized above:
a) Was this an experiment or a correlational study? How do you know? (If it's an experiment, what kind of study is it?)
b) What were the key variables in the study? Were they manipulated or measured?
c) Sketch a small graph of the results being described. Would a bar graph or a scatterplot make more sense?
Here's another study Zaki and Cikara introduce:
Signaling and conformity are not inherently positive. In 2016, the U.S. elected a president whose campaign was jammed with racist talking points. Prejudice subsequently increased, specifically toward groups he targeted (e.g., Muslims, immigrants).
d) This summary doesn't really help you figure out how the study was designed. But here's a chance to think carefully: What kind of study would we need to conduct in order to test the claim that "prejudice subsequently increased, specifically toward groups he targeted (e.g., Muslims, immigrants)."? There are three variables you would need to include in your study. What are they?
Suggested answers to selected questions
a) This was probably a posttest-only experiment, because it sounds like they manipulated the message about vegetarianism and measured what foods people took in the cafeteria. Here is a link to the original empirical article.
d) The key dependent variable in this study is prejudice levels, so that's the first variable. Then, in order to establish that "prejudice increased", you'd need to measure prejudice both before and after the election, so that's another variable. Finally, in order to show that it increased specifically toward groups he targeted, you'd need to measure different types of groups (Muslims, immigrants, as well as other potential groups that Trump did not deride in his campaign). You can review the Crandall article here. Do their results really support what Zaki and Cikara are saying about it? (Pay attention to the difference between people's actual prejudice and the normativity of prejudice.)