Publication
Title
Exploring the effect of personalized voting on affective polarization : prototypical leadership and campaign effects
Author
Abstract
Recent studies have shown that political information directly associated with a real-world leader tends to generate more (affective) polarization compared to similar information tied to a more impersonal source, such as a political party. The phenomenon is explained by the catalyzing role of leaders in the public’s inclination to maximize distinctiveness with outgroups. Leaders are used as stereotypical yardsticks based on their structural position and external visibility in (negative) campaigns. We link the preceding findings from the source cue literature to the preferential voting literature because a vote for a candidate or the party as a whole also is a source cue proxy. Concretely, we test whether voters casting a preference vote for an electoral leader are more affectively polarized than party voters by relying on the Belgian RepResent panel survey for the last parliamentary elections of 2019. This context provides an adequate electoral setting and adequate indicators to measure affective polarization and to distinguish (centralized) preference voters and party voters. Our findings show that (centralized) preference voters are indeed more affectively polarized and this can primarily be explained by a short(er)-term negative campaigning mechanism.
Language
English
Source (journal)
Acta politica : international journal of political science. - Meppel, 1965, currens
Publication
Meppel : 2024
ISSN
0001-6810 [print]
1741-1416 [online]
DOI
10.1057/S41269-023-00319-1
Volume/pages
(2024) , p. 1-27
ISI
001149218600001
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
Full text (open access)
The author-created version that incorporates referee comments and is the accepted for publication version Available from 28.01.2025
Full text (publisher's version - intranet only)
UAntwerpen
Faculty/Department
Research group
Publication type
Subject
Law 
Affiliation
Publications with a UAntwerp address
External links
Web of Science
Record
Identifier
Creation 29.01.2024
Last edited 08.12.2024
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