“Why do you think Christmas will never ever be celebrated again?” A paradoxical thinking intervention's potential to affect conflict-related concerns, willingness to compromise, and openness towards refugees

Abstract

The large number of refugees and host countries’ citizens’ reactions regarding their admission have been major global issues. Thus, psychological interventions to foster intergroup relations in the asylum context are desirable. In three experiments with general population samples (N = 986), we adapted a paradoxical thinking intervention to the intergroup context of Germans and refugees, thus testing its effectiveness in an early stage of conflict. Participants in the paradoxical condition, compared to two control conditions, showed lower levels of conflict-related concerns (Experiment 1), higher levels of openness to alternative information (Experiment 1, 3) and higher willingness to compromise (Experiment 2). In addition, the intervention was still successful when the sender of the paradoxical questions belonged to a political outgroup (Experiment 3). A mini-meta-analysis corroborated significant effects across experiments (for openness and willingness to compromise). Ideas for future research and the intervention's practical use are discussed (e.g., in social media).