The Impact of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict on Thinking Biases in Teaching Evaluations

Israel is the only country where minority and majority national groups between whom there is an ongoing political conflict attend the same institutions of higher education, either as students or as instructors. The present study illuminates the impact of a hitherto unstudied contextual factor on student evaluation of teaching, against the backdrop of longstanding political conflict between these 2 national groups. Using the analytical lens of the theory of homophily, it was predicted that Arab students would award higher teaching ratings to Arab instructors, and Jewish students would award higher teaching ratings to Jewish instructors. Findings showed a significant interaction effect between nationality of the student and nationality of the instructor; furthermore, Arab students tend to award higher ratings to instructors of both groups, as compared to their Jewish counterparts. Theoretical implications are discussed and practical recommendations are offered.