A professor of mine synthesized two human biases into something he called the Devil Shift. He said that for parties locked in longterm conflict, the combination of:

1. valuing losses more than gains, and

2. assimilation bias



result in demonizing your opponents.



Parties in conflict may struggle over policies for decades. Over the course of years, both will win and lose some battles. If people value losses more than gains, they will remember their loses more strongly than their wins. Over years, this will accumulate into a feeling that they frequently lose to their opponents, which will then feel as if their opponents are disproportionately powerful.



Assimilation bias is fairly straightforward. It says that people see and accept evidence that supports their positions better than they see and accept evidence against their positions. It can be as blatant as simply seeing the words on a page. If you give people numbered lists of ten statements that oppose their position, take the paper away and ask them how many sentences were on the page, they say "oh, you know. Seven or eight." They aren't lying. They didn't see the rest. Because of biased assimilation, people in policy conflicts think data and evidence that opposes their position is weaker than it is. Over time, they come to believe that people drawing conclusions from that data are exaggerating or outright liars.



Once you believe your opponents are disproportionately powerful liars, you have completed the Devil Shift.







Part of Dr. Sabatier's Advocacy Coalition Framework, Devil Shift.