Linguistic Intergroup Bias About the 2016 U.S. Presidential Candidates As a Function of Political Ideology

Abstract

The present study investigated preference for linguistically biased characterization of events attributed to Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump during the 2016 Presidential election cycle. The linguistic intergroup bias (LIB) reflects abstract characterization of positive events attributed to ingroup members and negative events attributed to outgroup members; conversely, it also reflects concrete characterization of negative events attributed to outgroup members and positive events attributed to outgroup members. University students (N = 117) who preferred Hillary Clinton completed on-line measures before and after the 2016 Presidential election, including liberal-conservative ideology and measures of LIB. Participants showed clear preference for characterizations consistent with LIB (e.g., Clinton is intelligent; Trump is quick-tempered). This pattern was more pronounced as strength of liberal ideology increased; it also was more pronounced immediately following the election than after time had passed. A smaller sample of Trump supporters also showed LIB favoring Trump. This study is the first to demonstrate that members of the electorate gravitate towards linguistic characterizations that favor their preferred political candidates and that this tendency is exacerbated by a relevant individual difference. Findings have implications for the continued polarization of the American electorate.

Integrating truth bias and elaboration likelihood to understand how political polarisation impacts disinformation engagement on social media

“…In fact, the relationship fully shifts from being negative for low political alignment to positive for high political alignment. The presence of in‐group bias could be a plausible reason for this result (Ruscher & Tipler, 2018) based on increased political alignment. For both subsets, political alignment interacted with GCS such that GCS was negatively related to truth bias for low political alignment and positively related to truth bias for high political alignment.…”