HxA members and friends convened in Denver June 12-14 to explore our 2022 conference theme of “Renewing Spaces of Knowledge and Trust”. Parallel to our main conference programming, HxA invited 10 groups of scholars to present their campus expression climate research during a poster session. These posters are below, and represent just some of the many lines of inquiry for better understanding what’s happening on campus and where is best to start as seek to improve practices of knowledge and trust.
The views of scientists, engineers, and professional school faculty about diversity, equity, and inclusion policies*
Steven Brint, Megan Webb, and Benjamin Fields
University of California-Riverside
“We find no evidence that STEM faculty are embedded in an evidence-based culture on issues that do not involve their own teaching and research specializations.”
Harnessing the power of narrative to improve perspective-taking and empathy**Kristi A Costabile, Abby S Boytos, and Stephanie Madon
Iowa State University“Daily story-telling is an enjoyable and effective way to create habit in which students engaged in more thoughtful, generous, and accurate judgments of others.”View the poster.
Campus expression, viewpoint diversity and academic freedom from the north of the border*Christopher Dummitt and Zachary Patterson
Trent University and Concordia University“[a] substantial minority of left leaning professors support censorship”View the poster.
Exploring free expression in the social work classroom*Jane Fenton and Mark Smith
University of Dundee“Although students believe the opposite to be true, students belonging to perceived ‘oppressor’ groups were the most reluctant to speak about controversial issues.”View the poster.
Promoting viewpoint diversity and perspective taking through fuzzy cognitive mapping**Cindy Frantz, Alita Boyse-Peacor, and Hannah Bouillon
Oberlin College“Perspective-taking via Mental Modeler shows promise as a means for promoting heterodoxy: our intervention stopped the decrease in heterodoxy and increased positive views of ideological opponents.”View the poster.
Curiosity kills closed minds: Cultivating curiosity to increase empathy in college students**Sara Konrath, Victoria Lagrange, Jasmine Litton, and Alison Jane Martingano
Indiana University“The idea that curiosity might motivate empathy has been hypothesized fordecades, although rarely empirically tested.”View the poster.
Self-censorship of political opinion on college campuses testing an intervention to change campus norms**Laurie O’Brien and Danica Kulibert
Tulane University“Students’ who perceive a college campus as less open to political diversity are more likely to self-censor and are less willing to share their political opinions”View the poster.
Highlights from the Canadian student survey of campus expression*Gina Cormier, Melanie Soderstrom, Andy Sellwoof, Annett Korner, Helen Thai, Ayse Turkoglu, and Martin Drapeau
McGill University“1 in 5 students attending an English university felt that there is a somewhat hostile or hostile climate towards people with their political beliefs in their program or department. 1 in 10 students attending a French university felt that there is a somewhat hostile or hostile climate towards people with their political beliefs in their program or department.”View the poster.
Illiberal Elitism on Top-Ranked CampusesSean T Stevens and Komi Frey
Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression“Since 2015, schools ranked in the US News’ top 25 experienced significantly more scholar sanction attempts, speaker disinvitation attempts, and successful speaker disinvitations, compared to the schools only ranked in the College Free Speech Rankings top 25.”View the poster.
Perceptions of Viewpoint Diversity on Campus: Data from three years of the Campus Expression Survey (CES)***Shelly C Zhou and Steven Zhou
Heterodox Academy“Students were consistently reluctant to discuss every controversial topic this survey examined.”View the poster.
* this research was part of a Flexible Funding Opportunity grant which was made possible in part or in full through the support of a grant from the John Templeton Foundation. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the John Templeton Foundation. ** this research was part of an Increasing Open Inquiry on College Campuses grant, which was made possible in part or in full through the support of a grant from the John Templeton Foundation. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the John Templeton Foundation. *** this research was made possible in full through the support of a grant from the John Templeton Foundation. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the John Templeton Foundation.
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