Young Generations' Hopelessness Perpetuates Intractable Conflicts

Abstract

In this paper we provide a new perspective on the fundamental question of why long-term violent conflicts are so difficult to resolve. We point at the generational gap in hope for peace as a potential explanation for the intractability of such conflicts. In a series of large-scale studies (Ntotal = 118,843) in the context of the violent Israeli-Palestinian conflict we show that younger generations from both rival groups, who are supposed to be the drivers of social change, are more hopeless and unwilling to compromise for peace than older generations. This phenomenon is explained by the general negativity bias among youth that diminishes with age. While aging may be a natural cure for hopelessness in long-term conflicts to some extent, we show that this process can be experimentally accelerated through a virtual reality-based aging simulation that increased young Israelis’ hope for peace.