Heterodox Academy

We are a politically diverse group of more than 1,800 professors and graduate students who have come together to improve the quality of research and education in universities by increasing viewpoint diversity, mutual understanding, and constructive disagreement.

WHAT IS VIEWPOINT DIVERSITY? WATCH OUR VIDEO.

How Does HxA Help?

We offer a range of resources designed to cultivate reasoned conversations, deeper empathy, the ability to see beyond one’s own perspective, and a capacity for meaningful engagement with diverse others. We partner with professors, administrators, and students to depolarize college campuses and classrooms.

Key Tools:

An interactive, psychology-based platform designed to depolarize campuses and foster mutual understanding across differences.

A self-report tool you can use to assess which students are feeling intimidated to speak up about which topics and why.

Rates America’s top 200 universities according to the degree of viewpoint diversity you can expect to find on campus.

LATEST BLOG POSTS

frontpage

- Curiosity is One Key to Heterodoxy. Forced Memorization is Not
  Dylan Selterman is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Psychology at the University of Maryland. Readers can follow him on Twitter @SelterMosby. Research shows that intellectual curiosity and openness to ideas are important for academic success. These traits are also relevant for heterodoxy—that is, the more curious people are, the more they will be appreciative of different viewpoints. Studies show that curiosity (but not knowledge) predicts bipartisan attitude convergence about environmental threats such as climate change. Thus, curiosity should be a cornerstone of pedagogy and heterodoxy. Most readers probably won’t object to this idea. But unfortunately, curiosity is de-emphasized in most contemporary educational environments, while rote memorization and high-stakes testing are prioritized—to the detriment of students’ well-being. Most modern university courses function in a top-down, hierarchical manner, where the teacher acts as an ideological authority figure, forcing information into students’ minds through mandatory readings, lectures, assignments, and exams. Most schools create a coercive learning atmosphere, where students feel they have no choice but to obey, lest they receive low marks on their transcripts that may diminish future prospects. Students’ intrinsic goals matter little in course design, and curiosity is largely absent from learning outcomes. Advocates for educational alternatives have noted this type of academic environment is not only ineffective, but also perhaps immoral. But what would an alternative educational model look like? Student-Driven Learning Democratic schools emphasize freedom of academic inquiry as well as social equality between students and faculty. There is no such thing as a singular truth in a such a school, because truth and knowledge are recognized as fluid constructs. Therefore, teachers never force their students to memorize facts or ideas, and students feel free to respectfully engage with their peers and treat teachers as equals. There is no standardized, enforced curriculum either, because students are free to develop their own educational paths through their sense of curiosity. Education reformer and academic Daniel Greenberg argued that democracy relies on the free expression of ideas, free assembly, and equality of opportunity. These principles ought to be built into schools, because schools are a good rehearsal space for democratic norms. Greenberg and his colleagues went on to found the Sudbury Valley School, which has, for many worldwide, become a model for intellectual freedom and curiosity. Some colleges and universities have adopted these principles into their pedagogical focus. For example, the New College of Florida does not assign letter/numbered grades, instead allowing students to shape their individualized curriculum based on their own curiosity and interests. At Deep Springs College, this is taken to an even further extreme, with students having control over admissions, faculty hiring, and other aspects of governance and administration. The documentary film Ivory Tower showcases what this type of academic community looks like, and it is strikingly different from most universities. Students not only are rigorously engaging with their coursework, but they also learn how to constructively communicate and disagree with each other. Former student Daniel Leibovitz is quoted as saying: “The main attraction of Deep Springs, for me, was self-governance—having to compromise with people, and having to put myself in other people’s positions. And I don’t think that’s something natural for us, that has to be taught.” In a dialogue with a different student, Joel Schlosser (a professor) remarked: “Every time I come in here and I say, what do you think about this, do you want to change these assignments, how do you like these readings, I’m trying to give you opportunities for agency…The purpose of this place is for you to create what you want here. The problem is, that for you to get what you want, you’ve got to cooperate with other people, which means trying to figure out a way to communicate your anger without being antagonistic.” Can you imagine what this would look like at your institution? Would you enjoy working in a department where there is no required curriculum or coursework for undergraduates, no multiple-choice exams, and no letter/number grades? Or if those elements are present, they would be determined through democratic exercise, where students and faculty have equal voices and power in the decision-making process? Should students be allowed to design their own courses, select their own course readings, and assess their own academic achievements? Reinforcing Orthodoxy Heterodox Academy was built by scholars who are concerned about specific problems that our colleges and universities are suffering from, including intolerance for diverse opinions, and fears of dissent and disagreement that quell otherwise productive speech. Some proposed solutions involve correcting for underrepresentation of ideological minorities, as well as creating tools to help students engage with each other regarding potentially sensitive or politicized topics. But another possibility is that the authoritarian construction of universities themselves is at the root of these problems, and these problems go hand-in-hand with the problem of students’ stifled curiosity. Standard instructional practices may actually be steering students toward narrow-mindedness and intolerance. A recent analysis shows that more education is linked with greater prejudice toward those with different ideological viewpoints. This is exactly the opposite of what we want schools to do. Students are socialized to value their own knowledge (much of which is temporary), which is reinforced by the mandatory assessments given to students. Walking out of classrooms with exam grades of As and Bs can give students an overinflated sense of confidence in their own knowledge or abilities relative to others, which can be detrimental to intellectual humility and curiosity. Recent studies have shown that college GPA is negatively correlated with students’ motivation to be creative and innovative, but academic achievement is positively correlated with intellectual arrogance. The better students perform, the more narrow-minded they become. A commonly held belief is that schools promote enlightened thinking. But why would that be the case? As educational historians note, schools were created to accomplish the reverse — to indoctrinate students and to promote obedience to authority figures. Some early proponents of compulsory schooling were religious zealots, who believed that children were born with original sin, and forced them to memorize Bible verses in classrooms. These methods (lectures plus rote memorization) are still commonly utilized in colleges today. In the wake of the Enlightenment, the focus shifted toward secular topics — such as mathematics, chemistry, history, literature — but the methods remained strikingly similar. Instead of indoctrinating students to be subservient to religious institutions, the goal shifted to make students subservient to the state, the military, and future employers. School was designed to impede free expression and stifle independent thought. No wonder professors and students feel inhibited to express controversial or unorthodox viewpoints. While it’s true that academic researchers are genuinely interested in free inquiry and discovery in their work, this often melts away when we step into the classroom and students are coerced into taking exams, reading books, or writing essays on topics they don’t enjoy, simply because the faculty value them. These methods are the antithesis of curiosity and free expression, which are central to our goals of promoting heterodoxy. Instead, universities ought to be truly democratic institutions. Students should retain full agency and autonomy in their academic goals, as well as power (through self-governance) to shape the policies and procedures of their community. Further Reading: Goyal, N. (2016). Schools on trial: How freedom and creativity can fix our educational malpractice. New York: Doubleday, an Imprint of Penguin Random House. Gray, P. (2015). Free to learn: Why unleashing the instinct to play will make our children happier, more self-reliant, and better students for life. New York: Basic Books. As an organization that prizes pluralism and disagreement — with more than 2k members holding diverse views on most issues — Heterodox Academy does not really have “official positions.” Opinions expressed here are those of the author(s). Publication does not imply endorsement by Heterodox Academy or any of its members. We welcome your comments below. Feel free to challenge and disagree, but please try to model the sort of respectful and constructive criticism that makes viewpoint diversity most valuable. Comments that include obscenity or that sound like a tirade or screed are likely to be deleted.... Read more...
- Trigger Warning: Empirical Evidence Ahead
  Payton Jones is a doctoral student in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University. Readers can follow him on Twitter @paytonjjones Every year, thousands of individuals receive trigger warnings on college campuses, on social media, and even in casual conversation. The vast majority of these individuals do not have any form of PTSD. What is the effect of trigger warnings on such individuals? Do trigger warnings, in the words of Haidt & Lukianoff, “coddle the American mind?” Or do they prepare individuals to brace themselves for distressing events, allowing them to face difficulties head-on? Along with my colleagues at Harvard Psychology Benjamin Bellet and Richard McNally, I conducted an experiment to get a first look. Our paper, “Trigger Warning: Empirical Evidence Ahead,” was recently published in the Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry. While this is only a preliminary look at trigger warnings in a non-traumatized population, it provides some insight into how trigger warnings might affect the mind. We are currently conducting replication studies in college students and in previously traumatized individuals to see if the results will replicate and generalize. Methods The study consisted of a very simple randomized experiment. A group of 270 individuals recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk read passages from literature. A power analysis determined that this sample was large enough to detect a small effect size in our analyses (1 – β error probability = 0.96). Half of the sample was given trigger warnings before some of the passages, and the other half received no trigger warnings at all. Trigger warnings were only given for passages that were rated as “distressing” in a pilot study. After each passage, individuals rated their own emotions. Although they rated a variety of emotions (so as not to clue them in to the true purpose of the study), we were interested in their rating of “anxiety”. Individuals rated their emotions on three passages before and after the section including trigger warnings, to establish a baseline anxiety rating and a follow-up anxiety rating. After reading passages, the participants completed a few follow-up measures. The questions of the study were extremely simple, and the methods and statistical models reflect this experimental simplicity. Results We had five questions. In each case, the independent variable was the binary condition of trigger warnings. The results were mixed, with trigger warnings affecting about half of the outcome measures. Did receiving trigger warnings alter participants’ perceptions of their own posttraumatic vulnerability? (e.g., “[If I were to suffer a trauma], I would not be able to work a job, or take care of myself”) Yes. Individuals who received trigger warnings rated themselves as more vulnerable (p < 0.05). Did receiving trigger warnings alter participants’ implicit perceptions of their own vulnerability? (tested by an implicit association test) No. There was no significant difference between the groups. Did receiving trigger warnings alter participants’ perceptions of others’ posttraumatic vulnerability? (e.g., “[If an average person were to suffer a trauma, that person would] not be able to work a job or take care of himself/herself”) Yes. Individuals who received trigger warnings rated an average person as more vulnerable (p < 0.05). This outcome was highly correlated with the outcome from the first question (r = 0.74). Did trigger warnings affect immediate anxiety response? Was this moderated by belief that “words can harm”? No and yes. Trigger warnings did not significantly affect immediate anxiety response. However, this effect was significantly moderated by the belief that words can harm (p < 0.01), such that individuals with a high belief that words can harm showed increases in anxiety if they received trigger warnings (p < 0.05). Did trigger warnings affect anxiety at follow-up? Was this moderated by belief that the world is predictable and controllable? No and no. Trigger warnings did not significantly affect anxiety at follow-up, and there was no evidence for moderation. Discussion This is the first scientific look at trigger warnings. It answers some questions, does not answer others, and raises additional ones. We will outline some of the major questions here: What is the overall message? Do trigger warnings help or harm? In this study, we found that trigger warnings occasionally harm, and the effects of this harm were small. However, it is important to remember that there is a third option: help, harm, or do nothing. For several of our outcomes, we found that trigger warnings do nothing (i.e., nothing statistically significant). In no cases did we find that trigger warnings help, but we also did not measure the sample that trigger warnings are intended to help (trauma survivors). I’m a teacher. Should I stop using trigger warnings? The evidence in this study is not strong or generalizable enough to make a conclusion about whether or not to use trigger warnings in the classroom. But it is also important to ask yourself the following question: if there is no evidence regarding whether or not a practice works, should I be using it? This is a personal question that you will have to answer for yourself (the microaggressions literature faces a similar challenge). I have seen researchers claiming that these results are “p-hacked”, not generalizable, or too small to care about. Is this true? The analyses were incredibly simple, leaving relatively little room for “p-hacking” (performing many analyses until statistically significant results are found). The study reports controlled and uncontrolled analyses, both of which gave the exact same pattern of results. The pattern of p-values is also unsurprising given that the two “marginal” p-values (0.01 < p < 0.05) in question came from highly correlated dependent variables (r = 0.74). The results are not immediately generalizable to individuals who have suffered from trauma. But it is important to remember that we have no evidence on these individuals – so although we shouldn’t jump to the conclusion that trigger warnings harm these individuals, we also shouldn’t jump to the conclusion that trigger warnings help these individuals. Are the effects “too small to care about”? It is hard to say. We gave only a handful of trigger warnings over a short period of time. At this point, it is impossible to know whether these effects accumulate over time. However, it is important to remember that even if trigger warnings did absolutely nothing, this is still something important enough to care about. Are trigger warnings a violation of free speech? This is a question that cannot be answered by scientific inquiry, as it depends on moral values rather than statistical outcomes. I want to learn more about the science behind trigger warnings. Is there anything else I can read? To the best of our knowledge, this was the first published empirical study on trigger warnings. However, there is a yet unpublished study which is available as a poster. The third author of the current study, an expert in PTSD research, has also written an op-ed in the New York Times on the topic. Citation: Benjamin W. Bellet, Payton J. Jones & Richard J. McNally. “Trigger Warning: Empirical Evidence Ahead.” Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry 61 (2018): 134-41. Editor’s note: This post was submitted, edited, and slated for publication weeks ago. However, a second peer-reviewed study on trigger warnings and their effects has just been published. Citation: Izzy Gainsburg & Allison Earl. “Trigger Warnings as an Interpersonal Emotion-Regulation Tool: Avoidance, Attention and Affect Depend on Beliefs.” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 70 (2018): 252-63. The findings are broadly consistent with Bellet, Jones & McNally’s, as Jones describes here. One interesting wrinkle is as follows: for those who were exposed to trigger warnings and believed that trigger warnings actually protect people, these respondents experienced increased anticipated negative affect (i.e. more anxiety about engaging the material) — and trigger warnings did a worse job for them at reducing experienced negative affect post-reading. This is broadly consistent with Bellet, Jones & McNally’s findings that those exposed to trigger warnings reported increased perceptions of vulnerability (of self and others), and that those who strongly believe “words can harm” experienced increased anxiety when exposed to trigger warnings — while there was no significant effect on anxiety among those who did not hold this belief. However, somewhat ironically perhaps, the Gainsburg & Earl study shows that those who dismissed trigger warnings as “coddling” had smaller increases in anticipated negative affect after being given a warning. And for them, being provided a trigger warning actually did correlate with decreased negative affect, and to an extent significantly stronger than in those who actually believed trigger warnings protect (again, Bellet, Jones & McNally found no effect for trigger warnings on reducing negative affect post-exposure to the material). Of course, the caveats mentioned above still hold fully: this is very preliminary research. Indeed, these mark the first empirical studies on the effects of trigger warnings. Much more work needs to be done in order to be confident in the results of these papers and any apparent implications. However, tentative conclusions from the two studies discussed here may include: to the extent that trigger warnings are actually effective at their intended purpose (reducing negative affect), it seems as though the effect is small, and may be most pronounced among those who believe in them the least. For those already predisposed to believe in trigger warnings and the logic behind them (they “protect” because “words can harm”), they seem to experience significantly higher anxiety and perceptions of vulnerability after being given trigger warnings — and for them, warnings have a significantly smaller impact on actually reducing negative affect post-exposure to controversial material. — Musa al-Gharbi 9/12/2018 As an organization that prizes pluralism and disagreement — with more than 2k members holding diverse views on most issues — Heterodox Academy does not really have “official positions.” Opinions expressed here are those of the author(s). Publication does not imply endorsement by Heterodox Academy or any of its members. We welcome your comments below. Feel free to challenge and disagree, but please try to model the sort of respectful and constructive criticism that makes viewpoint diversity most valuable. Comments that include obscenity or that sound like a tirade or screed are likely to be deleted.... Read more...

The Value of Heterodoxy in the Academy

Featured members discuss our vital mission and the issues that arise in climates of orthodoxy on campus, including Leda Cosmides, Robert P. George, Jonathan Haidt, Glenn Loury, John McWhorter, Steven Pinker, Richard Shweder, Nadine Strossen, and John Tooby.

“The whole educational process will be enriched and enlivened by a multiplicity of voices and perspectives.“
–Nadine Strossen

We welcome applications from academics, graduate students, and others.