Finding Common Ground: When Persuasion Fails and Belief Takes Over

In this special Grooving session, we unpack what happens when shared facts collapse and preferred beliefs take their place. Sparked by Kurt's firsthand experience during unrest in Minneapolis, this conversation explores why people reject lived experience, how identity defense and motivated reasoning shut down dialogue, and when it’s rational to stop trying to persuade altogether. Drawing on behavioral science, persuasion research, and real-world encounters, we examine how to choose your battles, why stories succeed where arguments fail, and what it actually takes to find common ground in a belief-first world.

You can listen to Finding Common Ground: When Persuasion Fails and Belief Takes Over online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Finding Common Ground: When Persuasion Fails and Belief Takes Over is an episode from Behavioral Grooves Podcast by Kurt Nelson, PhD and Tim Houlihan.

This episode is 52:28 long.

This episode was published on Feb 19, 2026.

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