Brexit Uncertainty Is Changing Our Communication Behaviour

In the wake of Theresa May’s failure to convince a skeptical parliament to back her deal, and Jeremy Corbyn’s no-confidence motion in the government being voted down, uncertainty continues to reign in the two-year Brexit saga. Even the word “Brexit” is still a sticky word to mention in polite conversation across the country, as people seem increasingly powerless to stop the momentum of the mandate that still bears the name and shame of the “people’s vote.”

But how is this manifesting in people’s day-to-day lives? Research found that over a million Britons dumped their significant other over Brexit, some Remainers are stockpiling food in fear of a no-deal import disruption, and uncertainty is sure to change people’s purchasing habits, with inflation slated to squeeze household incomes. Despite this, there’s the prevailing feeling that nothing has really changed yet; that we’re still waiting to understand what Brexit actually means for us. It’s in this personal climate of uncertainty that we’re beginning to see a change in communication behaviours online, which signals a shift in how a post-Brexit British public will interact with the brands leading the economy out of this uncertain mess.

The findings came from new research published this month in The Journal of Interactive Marketing, which found that the socio-political disruption of Brexit is psychologically akin to a natural disaster. It’s saturated with the psychological distress of  “causal uncertainty,” or uncertainty about why things happen in our lives. Using Twitter’s search API as a database, the study measured how polarised the conversations were, the emotional responses to events causing high causal uncertainty, and conducted a regression analysis using a psycho-linguistic scoring system to understand the connection between language and behaviour.  

The results? Since the Brexit vote, people have had a stronger accuracy motivation and more information-seeking behaviour, which makes sense as people are trying to get rid of uncertainty distress. The surprising finding, however, is that people look to high profile sources for answers, but paradoxically prefer more abstract types of messaging from these high-profile people or businesses. Abstract or idealistic language motivated the highest level of content engagement. Even though people are searching for answers, they’re also searching for the comfort of ideology; of narrative and stories. This suggests that the ongoing uncertainty of Brexit is continuing the cycle of narrative polarisation, and taking us further away from the cold, hard facts of Brexit reality.

The implications for this shift in communication behaviour are considerable. As brands and businesses have large online platforms and high social prominence, they’re under pressure to communicate in ways that help to alleviate uncertainty. People want psychological stability, but abstract messages motivate the most engagement, as they mirror individual users’ personal experiences. The tension between the macro-trends of political polarisation and the pressure on brands to share the values of consumers are playing out online, and this irrationality can have both positive and negative effects on brands and businesses. Behavioural economics suggests uncertainty can exacerbate our biases like overconfidence, which can lead to entrepreneurship and innovation, but it can equally lead to short-term thinking and missing long-term opportunities by falling victim to loss aversion bias. In this minefield, how can our communication styles keep us on the same page with our consumers and communities?

The answer may come from a behavioural economics concept called the conjunction fallacy or “The Linda Problem,” which suggests that people are psychologically biased to believe and stand behind stories that include additional information. It’s why people were so keen to jump behind Leave’s £350 million for the NHS claims. We can also see this at work with the deeply polarising Gillette Ad, “The Best a Man can Be.” It mixes a bold and direct discussion of topical gender issues with the narrative power of abstraction – (“Is this the best a man can be?”) – to create a conversation and garner more attention than any ad has in years. I’m not saying that all brands can or should take such a risky stance, even though I sincerely believe Gillette’s strategy will pay off in the long-run. If anything, this continues to prove that narrative has so much power over how people think and behave. Brands and businesses with high social prominence need to communicate stories that both satisfy the topical information seeking behaviour of consumers, and the hunger that people have for abstract narrative or idealistic messaging.

If we can be certain about one thing in this Brexit climate, it’s that Brexit is changing us; changing the way we communicate, and changing how we interact with one another. If the current state of political turmoil is any indication, this uncertainty isn’t going anywhere soon. The challenge for those of us weathering the storm is to navigate the irrational and shifting ground of human communication, while keeping an eye on what people really want. Or, perhaps, staking a claim to what post-Brexit culture really needs.