The 2024 presidential election results are in, and it seems like Americans are more polarized than ever. For years, we’ve seemed to live in an increasingly polarized society of Democrats and Republicans, red states and blue states, liberals and conservatives. But how divided is our society? And is that perception truly the reality? On this episode of “The State We’re In,” More in Common Executive Director Jason Mangone discusses the organization’s research into the “perception gap” and its efforts to unite increasingly divided societies. 

By Rosemary Ford and Caitlin Agnew

This article has been edited for length and clarity.

Rosemary Ford:

First, tell us more about More in Common, and what you do. 

Jason Mangone:

More in Common is a nonpartisan research organization that tries to reduce the harmful aspects of polarization. That means that we try to understand the forces driving us apart, see common ground and bring Americans together to tackle our shared challenges as a practical matter. That means we release dozens of studies and polls every year, and the punchline of a lot of our work is sort of in the name. We think that Americans have way more in common than we think we do.

Rosemary Ford:

Tell us about the perception gap study. How did that come about? How was it conducted? 

Jason Mangone:

To begin with, it's probably worth defining what we mean by perception gap. So a perception gap is the difference between what someone thinks their political opponent feels about an issue and what their political opponent actually feels about an issue. It’s implicit in the idea that we have more in common than we think we do. There's some sort of fundamental misunderstanding going on that we don't really get one another — particularly in the arena of politics. That's because we think politics is a really poor lens for understanding someone in general. 

We wanted to look into these ideas, which is sort of the inspiration study. We released our first perception gap study in 2019, and we've been releasing various perception gaps ever since. To give an example of how we conduct these studies, let's say that we wanted to gauge Democrats' perception gaps on a particular issue. We begin by asking thousands of Republicans whether they agree with something. So, for example, we've asked thousands of Republicans, “Do you agree that Americans have a responsibility to learn from our past and fix our mistakes?” Turns out, about 93% of Republicans agree with this statement. We then asked thousands of Democrats, “What percentage of Republicans do you think agree with that statement?” It turns out that all Democrats estimate that only about 35% of Republicans would agree with the statement. That means that, on the issue, “Do you agree that Americans have a responsibility to learn from our past and fix their mistakes?” there's a 58% perception gap — 93% of Republicans agree with that statement, but only 35% of Democrats think Republicans would agree with that.

Rosemary Ford:

What were the key findings of the study? 

Jason Mangone:

One in particular, I think, is the idea of patriotism, love of country and understanding of our history that's been cycling through our politics for the last eight or 10 years. I think there's a stereotype where we think that Republicans think that American history is perfect, that we've done no wrong, and we stereotype Democrats as classifying our entire history as sort of sinful. 

I've already highlighted an example of the Democrat perception gap here, but Republicans estimate that only 45% of Democrats agree with this statement. In other words, we think that our political opponents either love our history and our country blindly, or they want to dismiss our history completely. In truth, an overwhelming majority of Americans agree with the idea that our country has both achieved great things and also made some harmful mistakes along the way, and that both of these things are true at the same time. So all that is to say, our ideas of our sense of history and our ideas of patriotism are much more aligned than we think they are. We have a ton of perception gaps. 

In addition to the idea of patriotism, I also wanted to highlight one around immigration. It turns out that over 85% of Republicans agree that properly controlled immigration can be good for America. Democrats estimate that only around half of Republicans agree with this statement, so they underestimated by about 35%. On the same issue, around 75% of Democrats disagree with the idea that we should have open borders, but Republicans estimate that only around 40% of Democrats hold this view, meaning there's a 35% perception gap.

All that is to say, as it turns out, is that most Americans want a secure system of legalized immigration and most Americans want both order and compassion for immigrants. Obviously, that's not how we talk about it in the political arena.

Rosemary Ford:

How expected were these findings? 

Jason Mangone:

We knew that there would be gaps in people's understanding, particularly when the lens through which you're looking at those gaps is politics. We do a really, really bad job of understanding who people are and who are political opponents. So that wasn't altogether surprising. 

What was most surprising to me was some of the drivers of these gaps. Anytime that More in Common does a study, we break the American population down into seven segments that we think are much more representative about how people view themselves in the world than sheer red or blue demography. The farthest left and the farthest right are referred to as the wings.Those groups in the middle are referred to as the exhausted majority. So it goes from progressive activists, traditional liberals, passive liberals, the politically disengaged, the moderates, traditional conservatives and devoted conservatives.

The most surprising thing to me, pretty much, anytime we do a perception gap study is that if you look at the rates of perception gaps, it's almost a perfect V shape, which is to say the perception gaps are perception gaps are greatest among those people on the wings of politics, and they’re lowest among the politically disengaged, right in the middle. The surprising thing there is that the people that are the most politically disengaged have the best understanding of what their political opponents actually think about various political issues.

Rosemary Ford:

What role is social media playing in all of this? How does that influence the perception gap or influence it?

Jason Mangone:

First off, I never like to come across as completely anti-social media. I think that it's given people freedom to express ideas, which is vital and important. I also think that it's a relatively new technology, and we're figuring out how to fit it in to our day-to-day lives right now.

With that being said, when it comes to politics, most of the algorithms in social media are driven by engagement, and the most engaging content tends to be divisive. It's also true that the people who are likely to share political views on social media are progressive activists on one wing and devoted conservatives on the other. So I wouldn't say that it's entirely social media's fault. I would say that progressive activists and devoted conservatives tend to be the most active on social media. Those algorithms tend to highlight the most divisive views because they tend to be the most engaging. It's what we want to consume.

As a result, a lot of our political discourse becomes driven by people on the wings. I think the important distinction there is that it's not entirely the social media companies’ fault. A lot of it is who's actually willing to get out there and share political views on social media. It turns out that it’s the people who are most politically engaged, who frame things primarily through the lens of politics, and those people in general tend to be people on the wings.

Rosemary Ford:

Why should the average person be concerned about the perception gap? 

Jason Mangone:

I think it's really a call to have some political humility. Don't think about people as entirely political animals. One of the implicit ideas in perception gaps is that you could look at perception gaps between any two out groups — Democrats-Republicans, Yankees fans-Red Sox fans, and I'm sure that there are misunderstandings among a lot of them. The point is that when we look at things through a primarily political lens, we tend to misunderstand, because politics is a really, really bad lens for understanding a human being. I think how the average person should react to it and why they should be concerned by it is that, because politics shapes so much of our culture and so much of how we think about ourselves nowadays, it's a call that we're really misunderstanding one another.

Rosemary Ford:

In light of the election, what do you expect to see with the perception gap?

Jason Mangone:

I will caveat what I’m about to say by saying that we have a poll hitting the field where we ask a number of perception gap questions, because whatever is in the media tends to have the highest perception gaps. I would guess that the largest perception gaps are going to be around issues associated with the biggest news, and today it's the fact that former President Trump won not just the Electoral College, but the national popular vote. So I would imagine that the largest perception gaps will be around people's perspectives on Trump, not just as a political figure, but as a human being. 

Rosemary Ford:

Do you have suggestions for bridging this divide? 

Jason Mangone:

I'll start with what the worst idea is. The worst idea is to say, “We're going to get a bunch of us together and we're going to talk about politics, because we all disagree with each other.” We need to talk, that's fine, but an example is the holidays. Around my dinner table, around the holidays, there's some Trump voters and there's some Harris voters, there's some Republicans, there's some Democrats, there's some upper-middle-class folks, there's some working-class folks. We don't go to that holiday dinner saying, “We're gonna get together and talk about our political differences.” No, we get together because we're a family. We share our common values and traditions, and the food's really good, and all the other stuff might come up as a result. But the point is, we see one another in our common humanity, because the thing that got us there is much more important than sheer demography that's ultimately colored blue or red. 

So that's a really long way of saying, get involved in your community in ways that have nothing to do with politics. Join a club, join the board of your local Little League, become a volunteer firefighter — there's a million things that you can do. But the point is, get together, where people across the political spectrum might be getting together for reasons that have nothing to do with politics.

Rosemary Ford:

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this. 

“The State We’re In” is a weekly digital public affairs show produced by NH PBS and The Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communications. It is shared with partners in the Granite State News Collaborative, of which both organizations are members. These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.