False Consensus Among Middle-Eastern and Western Israeli Students.

The article examines perceptions of false consensus (FC) among Middle-Eastern and Western Israeli Jews. Perception of belief similarity is relevant to the area of interethnic relations because on the interpersonal level, the more issues people agree on, the more they are attracted to each other (Byrne, 1969). On the intergroup level, it has been hypothesized that assumed belief dissimilarity breeds prejudice and interethnic conflict. The results of the study partially support the hypothesis that Westerners, but not Middle-Easterners, express a stronger FC toward the members of their ethnic in-group than they do toward the members of their ethnic out-group. First, although both the Middle-Eastern and the Western subjects displayed a stronger FC toward their respective ethnic in-group than toward their respective ethnic out- group, this tendency was less pronounced among Middle-Easterners than among the Westerners. Second, the Middle-Easterners displayed a stronger FC toward Westerners than the Westerners did toward the Middle-Easterners.