Group Think
3/23/20261 hr 28 min
How do the groups you identify with shape your sense of self? Do they influence the beer you buy? The way you vote? In this favorite episode from 2021, psychologist Jay Van Bavel explains how our group loyalties affect us more than we realize, and can even shape our basic senses of sight, taste and smell. Then, look out! There's a g-g-g-ghost! Psychologist Coltan Scrivner answers listener questions about the surprising benefits of scary entertainment.
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Episode illustration by Eva Wahyuni for Unsplash+.
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Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsShankar Vedantam· Host0:00
This is Hidden Brain. I'm Shankar Vedantam. When Nelson Mandela became South Africa's first Black president in nineteen ninety-four, he had big dreams for his bitterly divided country.
Nelson Mandela· Soundbite0:11
We enter into a covenant that we shall build a society, a rainbow nation, at peace with itself and the world.
Shankar Vedantam· Host0:21
He had spent a lifetime fighting the racist apartheid regime, including more than a quarter century in prison.
Jay Van Bavel· Guest0:29
He was a heroic figure already by that time. Uh, but to many white South Africans, they saw him as a criminal and a terrorist.
Shankar Vedantam· Host0:36
This is psychologist Jay Van Bavel. As president of a united South Africa, Nelson Mandela, or Madiba, as he was known to his supporters, needed to find a way for the people in his rainbow nation to see themselves as South Africans first. Other politicians might have turned to speeches and policies. Madiba turned to sports.
Speaker 3· Soundbite0:59
[crowd cheering] Play continues. Offside by New Zealand.
Jay Van Bavel· Guest1:01
He used the Rugby World Cup, which was being hosted in South Africa, and during the apartheid era, South Africa had been banned from competition. And the South African team was known as the Springboks, and they were beloved by the white South Africans and despised by the Black population. But what Mandela did was he went out onto the podium, um, not just as the president, but as a fan. He had the green Springboks cap and jersey, and he used it as a way to make a