How Do Observers Assess Resolve?

Kertzer, Joshua D.; Renshon, Jonathan; Yarhi-Milo, Keren

doi:10.1017/s0007123418000595

Cited by 44 publications

(56 citation statements)

References 84 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…In this article, we seek to directly assess the attributes of incidents ordinary citizens use to define incidents as terrorism. We do so using a conjoint experimental design (Hainmueller, Hopkins, and Yamamoto ; Kertzer, Renshon, and Yarhi‐Milo ) in which we present our participants with a series of incidents with randomly generated features and then ask whether they would classify each incident as terrorism. The use of a ratings‐based conjoint design offers two main advantages.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

How the Public Defines Terrorism

Huff

Kertzer

2017

American J Political Sci

117

118

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

(Hattem 2015). His assessment was condemned from across the political spectrum, from critics on both the left (including then Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton) and right (including then GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum). Similar public debates erupted following other violent incidents, including the bombing at the Boston Marathon and shooting in Orlando, Florida. These debates highlight not only the contentiousness of classifying terrorism, but also the stakes involved in doing so, for policy makers, academics, and members of the public alike. In this article, we turn to experimental methods to explain the tenor of these public debates. We investigate terrorism in a public opinion context not because we believe that the mass public's intuitions can necessarily resolve normative debates about what should or should not be considered terrorism, but rather because of the central role that public opinion plays in our understanding of how terrorism works. In a vast array of prior research, terrorism is understood as a form of violence that functions by attracting public attention. It is because terrorism hinges on public reaction that Margaret Thatcher suggested terrorists depend on "the oxygen of publicity," that Carlo Pisacane declared terrorism to be "propaganda by deed," and that Ayman al-Zawahiri suggested that for al-Qaeda, media coverage is "more than half" the battle (Smith and Walsh 2013, 312). If the responses of ordinary citizens constitute a central causal mechanism through which terrorism operates, it logically follows that understanding what ordinary citizens think terrorism is is a crucial prerequisite to understanding how they react to it.

show abstract

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…See, for example, Malle and Knobe (), Kertzer and McGraw (), and Kertzer, Renshon, and Yarhi‐Milo ().…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

How the Public Defines Terrorism

Huff

Kertzer

2017

American J Political Sci

117

118

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…As has been noted elsewhere (Kertzer, Renshon, & Yarhi‐Milo, ), Amazon's Mechanical Turk has grown in popularity in experimental social science. Berinsky, Huber, and Lenz (, p. 366) show that MTurk samples are “often more representative of the general population and substantially less expensive to recruit” than other “convenience samples” often used in political science.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 64%

“…Virtually all experimental designs in IR involve a variety of trade‐offs. For instance, some prefer the approach of asking individuals to take on the perspective of a decision‐maker; however, it has been shown that taking on the perspective of a foreign policy leader results in individuals behaving more hawkishly than they otherwise would (Kertzer & Renshon, ). The hypothetical scenario itself might also be problematic, given its minimal nature; however, the trade‐off is between a short scenario that is easily comprehensible versus a more detailed scenario that might lose the attention of participants.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thawing Rivalries and Fading Friendships: An Experimental Approach to Rapprochement and Alienation

Albuyeh

Paradis

2017

Political Psychology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Although international relations (IR) theorists generally assume that actors update their beliefs about the intentions of adversaries and allies based on structure, costly signaling, and past actions, little is known about how the process of rapprochement between adversaries differs from the process of alienation between allies, particularly with respect to the nature and degree of costly signaling. Furthermore, until recently the role of the individual in these processes has only been engaged by a small number of scholars, and fewer still have integrated this perspective with conventional approaches to rapprochement and alienation. Drawing from findings in social psychology, We present results from an original survey experiment showing that (1) political belief systems are a powerful determinant of how individuals perceive the intentions of other states, more so than an observed state's signaling behavior; (2) there are diminishing returns in increasing the cost of a signal; and (3) hostile signals are more effective in signaling intent than reassuring signals.In international relations, communication between states is inherently difficult. States often have reasons to misrepresent their interests, capabilities, and resolve. During the Cold War, how could the United States credibly threaten to launch a nuclear strike if faced with Soviet aggression against an ally? More recently, how were American and Iranian leaders to know whether the other would fulfill their obligations under the nuclear deal? Looking forward, how can North Korean and American leaders ever establish trust? After decades of antagonism and mistrust, how can international adversaries clearly show that they will keep their word? How can relations be improved? One method of enhancing the credibility of a signal is by making it "costly." For example, public statements of intentions are viewed as costly because the leader's reputation may suffer if they do not keep their word.In this article, we examine psychological factors that influence whether an individual updates their prior beliefs about the intentions of a state in the face of costly signals. International relations (IR) theory places a great deal of focus on the effects of costly signaling, the perceived hostile intent of adversaries, and to a lesser degree, the perceived benign intent of allies. Yet we still understand little about the psychology of belief updating as it pertains to the process of rapprochement between 0162-895X

show abstract

“…At the other extreme, we can envision a world in which situational factors always trump dispositional ones and events are independent. In 54 Yarhi-Milo, Kertzer, and Renshon 2018;Kertzer, Renshon, and Yarhi-Milo 2019. 55 Kertzer, Rathbun, and Rathbun 2020.…”

Section: Differences Among Observersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Redefining the Debate Over Reputation and Credibility in International Security

Jervis¹,

Yarhi-Milo²,

Casler³

2020

World Pol.

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

A wave of recent scholarship has breathed new life into the study of reputation and credibility in international politics. In this review article, the authors welcome this development while offering a framework for evaluating collective progress, a series of related critiques, and a set of suggestions for future research. The article details how the books under review represent an important step toward consensus on the importance of reputation in world politics, elucidating scope conditions for when reputational inferences are likely to be most salient. The authors argue that despite the significant accomplishments of recent studies, the scholarly record remains thin on the psychology of the perceiver and is instead focused on situational factors at the expense of dispositional variables and is rather myopically oriented toward reputation for resolve to the exclusion of other important types. Despite its contributions, the new literature still falls short of a full explanation for how actors draw inferences about reputation. These remaining theoretical challenges demand scholarly attention and suggest a role for psychology in filling some of the gaps.

show abstract

How Do Observers Assess Resolve?

Cited by 44 publications

References 84 publications

How the Public Defines Terrorism

How the Public Defines Terrorism

Thawing Rivalries and Fading Friendships: An Experimental Approach to Rapprochement and Alienation

Redefining the Debate Over Reputation and Credibility in International Security

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About