The stereotype of a good and upstanding person is incompatible with the stereotype of [dark matter], and rather than make a complicated and effortful update to a more nuanced stereotype, people often simply snap to “well, I guess they were Secretly Horrible All Along, all of my direct evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.”
Maybe people really do change their assessments of people they know well. But maybe they decide that they’re not willing to take the punishment risk from appearing to defend (or even conceal) One Of Them. The best way to avoid that is to pretend to suddenly decide that this person is horrible. With or without applying motivated cognition to intentionally convince yourself of it.
I’m not even sure which one would be the majority.
Maybe people really do change their assessments of people they know well. But maybe they decide that they’re not willing to take the punishment risk from appearing to defend (or even conceal) One Of Them. The best way to avoid that is to pretend to suddenly decide that this person is horrible. With or without applying motivated cognition to intentionally convince yourself of it.
I’m not even sure which one would be the majority.