Seeing Red (And Blue): Partisan Identity, Emotions, and Selective Exposure

ABSTRACT

Selective exposure occurs when individuals gravitate toward attitude-consistent information. In the United States, partisan identity guides selective exposure behavior. While partisanship is the typical culprit for partisan media selectivity, scholars have recommended examining the causal mechanisms underlying this relationship. This study examines the relationship between partisan identity threat and reassurance and selective exposure as well as the moderating effect of partisan identity strength and mediating effect of anger and enthusiasm. We find that partisan identity threat is associated with anger, reassurance with enthusiasm, and that the relationship increased as partisan strength increased. Threat and reassurance did not directly spur selective exposure, though we found an indirect effect of partisan reassurance on selective exposure via enthusiasm, which strengthened as partisanship intensified.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Notes

1. Due to neutrality concerns, we conducted a post-hoc test analyzing emotional responses to our control stimulus and an article on oven repair (see online appendix). Results of paired samples t-tests found no differences in anger (t(128) = 0.378, p = .901) or enthusiasm (t(128) = 5.086, p = .325) between the articles. However, the oven repair article was rated as less neutral (t(128) = -5.239, p = .002) and more anxiety-inducing (t(128) = 4.929, p < .001)

2. Results of a repeated measures ANOVA using the Greenhouse-Geisser correction revealed that all of the liberal stories were rated as significantly more liberal than the conservative and entertainment stories, and the conservative stories were rated as significantly more conservative than both the liberal and entertainment stories, F(4.669, 228.795) = 73.316, p < .001. All political headlines were rated significantly more political than the entertainment stories F(6.248, 174.332) = 98.211, p < .001.

3. One-way ANOVA results revealed no significant differences between conditions on age, education, income, political interest, or ideology. Chi-square results revealed no significant associations between gender or education and condition.