Episode Details

Ben Rosenberg studies how people react to having their freedom threatened. He is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Dominican University of California. In addition to conducting his own studies on this question, he has exhaustively reviewed decades of research on something called "psychological reactance theory." In our conversation, we break down what reactance is, where it comes from, who it applies to, and what questions about it are still unanswered.

Things that come up in this episode:

• 2022 set new records for attempts to ban books in the United States (Associated Press, 2023)
• In the intro, I tell a personal story about book bans in my school district, but don't worry--I have sources (1, 2, 3)
• Banning books has been linked to increases in sales (e.g., The Hill, 2022)
• Psychology research has found that censorship can change people's attitudes (e.g., Worchel & Arnold, 1973)
• Ben and his advisor summarized a long history of research on psychological reactance (Rosenberg & Siegel, 2018)

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