“cognitive demagogy, i. e. an offer of information that is increasingly indexed to the nature of demand.”

“…free competition of ideas does not always favor the most methodical and reasonable thought. “

“…free competition of ideas does not always favor the most methodical and reasonable thought. “

“We’d hope that facts would be the currency of influence,..But often, we guess at who’s the expert—and we’re wrong.” People tend to rely too much on “messy proxies for expertise”—such as a speaker’s confidence level, extroversion, gender and/or race—and not enough on the content of his or her contributions, when making judgments about expertise”

“The correlation between a speaker’s confidence and his or her expertise is often “very small,”

“Changes over time in indicators racial/global status threat far more influential as predictors of greater Republican … advantage and …greater likelihood of Republican vote choice.”

“…public acceptance of openly disrespectful statements about women, minorities, and foreigners is as manifestations of preexisting racist and sexist views…”

“A possible explanation is dominant group status threat. When members of a dominant group feel threatened, several well-established reactions help these groups regain a sense of dominance and wellbeing. First, perceived threat makes status quo, hierarchical social and political arrangements more attractive (18). Thus, conservatism surges along with a nostalgia for the stable hierarchies of the past. Perceived threat also triggers defense of the dominant ingroup, a greater emphasis on the importance of conformity to group norms, and increased outgroup negativity (19, 20). It is psychologically valuable to see one’s self as part of a dominant group; therefore, when group members feel threatened, this prompts defensive reactions. It is precisely this form of group threat that may have motivated Trump supporters.”

“Evidence points overwhelmingly to perceived status threat among high-status groups as the key motivation underlying Trump support.”

“…growing domestic racial diversity and globalization contributed to a sense that white Americans are under siege by these engines of change.”

“Those who read practice surprisingly many cognitive abilities. Good readers have a better verbal short-term memory, can perceive categories faster, can name images, colors and symbols more quickly, or predict how a spoken sentence could continue.”