Some things are better left behind: adolescent transmission of conflict narratives in a divided society

This pre-registered study investigated how adolescents in a context of long-standing ethno-political polarization – Northern Ireland - transmit contested narratives. Much like the children’s game of telephone, adolescents (N=395, M_age =14.56, SD=2.16; range 10-18 years; 55.7% female, 42.0% male; 57.1% White-Irish, 32.5% White-British, 6.3% White-Other) read and recalled narratives for other participants; a process repeated sequentially across chains of four people. Narratives were either conflict-related or a non-conflict control. Across homogeneous (same ethno-political group) and mixed (alternating group) chains, we found that information was rapidly lost or changed. This occurred to a greater extent in conflict compared to non-conflict conditions. We found no evidence for preferential transmission of ingroup enhancing information, though non-partisan recall slightly decreased with age. Adolescent information transmission may interrupt cycles of division in conflict-affected settings.