Article Summary
Introduction
In the wake of a substantial body of research documenting the rise of partisan animosity in the United States has been an equally substantial literature on interventions aimed to reduce such animosity. Given affective polarization is often rooted in either social and ideological cleavages, many interventions aim to assuage perceptions of differences between partisans or increase feelings of common ground. Oftentimes, however, exactly which ground is being bridged is vague, as signals of similarity on policy grounds also signal similarity on social grounds (and vice-versa). There is an open question, then, as to which factors reduce affective polarization: group-based appeals or policy-based appeals.
Huddy and Yair attempt to answer this question in this paper, independently analyzing the effects of group warmth and policy similarity on affective polarization. Their results from two experimental studies help to understand the facets of certain interventions that may prove most useful in cooling partisan antipathy, especially in interventions emphasizing the behavior of political elites.
Analytical Approach
The authors conduct two online survey experiments (n = 290 and 1,040, respectively) with respondents recruited through Amazon MTurk identifying as either Democrats or Republicans. In both studies, respondents were presented with a mock news story about an encounter between Senators Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell. In the first study, respondents were assigned to one of nine conditions in a 3x3 factorial design. The authors independently randomized 3 levels of 2 conditions: social relations (warm, hostile, control) and issue compromise (compromise, no compromise, control). In the second study, the control levels were dropped from each of the conditions. These conditions are explained in detail in the table below.
Table 1: Study 1 Conditions
| Social/Issue | Compromise | No Compromise | Control (Study 1 only) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Warm | Pleasant encounter (laughing, hugging) + Willing to compromise on border wall/DACA | Pleasant encounter + Unwilling to compromise on border wall/DACA | Pleasant encounter only |
| Hostile | Hostile encounter (obscenities, yelling) + Willing to compromise on border wall/DACA | Hostile encounter + unwilling to compromise on border wall/DACA | Hostile encounter only |
| Control (Study 1 only) | Willing to compromise on border wall/DACA only | Unwilling to compromise on border wall/DACA only | No details of encounter |
After seeing the scenario, respondents are asked a series of questions about in- and out-party affect, traits (closed-/open-minded, moderate/extremist, moral/immoral), and social distance (marriage/coworker preference) on 0-10 scales. In study 2, questions about coworker social distance were replaced by measures of interpersonal trust. From these component measures, the authors construct summary scales for in- and out-party sentiments. These outcome variables are regressed on the experimental conditions to determine the independent effects policy and social compromise have on feelings of out-party antipathy.
Main Findings
Across both studies, the authors find respondents who read about a warm social interaction between the two rival senators had modest increases (0.04-0.08 on a 0-1 scale) in out-party affect across most measures. The authors found significant increases in both the affective and summary measures for both studies, with mixed results for the other dependent variables of interest. Conversely, the authors find no significant relationship between the compromise treatments and any of the measures of out-party affect in either study. This suggests the pathway to alleviating affective polarization primarily comes through social relationships rather than issue agreement.
In particular, the warm social condition appeared to have a more substantial absolute impact than the hostile condition (relative to control). There was no discernable difference in the compromise/non-compromise effects, and splitting the compromise effect between in- and out-party politicians had similarly null results.
The authors test a number of potential experimental moderators, such as strength of partisan identity, prior agreement with policy positions, and conflict aversion, and found no significant changes in results. Additionally, the authors also performed similar analyses on in-party affect, and failed to detect any significant movement in attitudes.
Implications
In aggregate, these results suggest group-based considerations may outweigh policy-based considerations with regard to reductions in affective polarization; partisans appear more amenable to warm social cues than commensurate policy positions. Methodologically, it helps disentangle two sources of affective polarization that have proved difficult to separate, and offers researchers a simple method with which to do so.
More broadly, one potential implication of this study is there may exist a tolerance for respectful disagreement between parties. Furthermore, visibility of cross-party friendships at the elite level may offer positive cues to partisans to behave similarly. These implications align under a more “top-down” approach suggested by the authors. While not wholly at odds with more identity-based depictions of partisan animosity, the results do suggest party leadership acts as a focusing lens on certain group-based grievances.
Questions left unanswered
While the authors provide us with convincing evidence that group-based factors are more important in reducing affective polarization than policy-based factors, there are a few limitations to how far that conclusion can be taken. By their own admission, they do not test the full array of policy issues where partisans may be divided. It is possible compromises on other issue positions may provide better inroads against affective polarization. Furthermore, the results are predicated on witnessing interactions between party leaders, so it is unclear if there would be similar effects if a design were deployed using more rank-and-file partisans. The top-down component of the study is emphasized in the discussion, but may be playing a more important role in the reduction of affective polarization than either of the component factors the authors are testing.
Methods and Analysis
Was the study and its analyses pre-registered?: No
Did the study rely on proxy variables to measure polarization?: Yes
Party warmth was measured 0-10 (not 0-100) and combined into an out-party warmth scale with other social distance/trait metrics.
Were standard p-value thresholds used (p<.05 or 95% Confidence Intervals that don’t overlap zero)?: Yes
- Largest p-value presented as significant: 0.05
Were correlational results interpreted with causal language?: No
Limitations / Weaknesses
The authors readily admit there are sample size constraints in their studies that do not allow them to fully test interactions between different treatments, and the absolute sizes of the effects seem rather small (making it particularly likely the effects may not last over a longer time horizon). Such concerns could easily be remedied with a larger replication of the study. Perhaps a more pressing concern, however, is on the separability of policy- and group-based factors. The authors claim they are able to independently measure the effects of both factors due to their independent randomization of the factors. As has been demonstrated in similar studies measuring differences in affect versus ideology leading to partisan antipathy (Orr and Huber, 2020), social warmth can likely be inferred from policy agreement, and vice-versa. When the respondents see the type of warmth manipulated in the experiment, with Schumer and McConnell laughing and hugging, it implies much more than just social closeness. At the very least, there is more information about their views of each other given by the social cues than the policy cues, which are limited to one issue. This may inadvertently stack the deck in favor of a finding that social warmth has an outsized influence on affect.
Open Data & Analyses
Does the article make the replication data publicly available?: No
Does the article make the replication analysis scripts publicly available?: No
Article Citation
Huddy, L. and Yair, O. (2021), Reducing Affective Polarization: Warm Group Relations or Policy Compromise?. Political Psychology, 42: 291-309. https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12699
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@article{https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12699,
author = {Huddy, Leonie and Yair, Omer},
title = {Reducing Affective Polarization: Warm Group Relations or Policy Compromise?},
journal = {Political Psychology},
volume = {42},
number = {2},
pages = {291-309},
keywords = {affective polarization, partisanship, experiment, leader relations, issue compromise},
doi = {https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12699},
url = {https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/pops.12699},
eprint = {https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/pops.12699},
year = {2021}
}