Melissa Ferguson, a professor of psychology at Cornell University and expert on how people form and change our first impressions of others, says if Hillary Clinton wants to draw former Bernie Sanders and sway independents and moderate voters, she will need to correct myths and show voters something new about who she is.
Bio: http://www.fergusonlab.com/
Ferguson says:
“The question of whether people can change their implicit first impression about Hillary Clinton is of particular importance for the campaign given that she is hoping to draw former Bernie Sanders supporters who may have felt negatively toward Clinton during the primary season. Such supporters may say they are on board, but are they really?
“Our recent findings show that although it can be difficult to change people’s implicit first impressions of others, there are certain cases where it is possible. If people learn something new about the person or candidate that they think is especially revealing about who that person is, this kind of information can change even their implicit impressions about that person.
“An especially potent type of information is when people learn a new interpretation of an older behavior or event that they thought they understood. When people learn that a negative piece of information about a person was actually misinterpreted, or falsely portrayed, they can update their negative impression of the person, and see the person in a positive light, even implicitly. The key is that they have to believe that the new information really does change the meaning of the older information.”
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