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A Psychological Profile of the Alt-Right
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Abstract
The 2016 U.S. presidential election coincided with the rise of the "alternative right," or alt-right . Alt-right associates have wielded considerable influence on the current administration and on social discourse, but the movement's loose organizational structure has led to disparate portrayals of its members' psychology and made it difficult to decipher its aims and reach. To systematically explore the alt-right's psychology, we recruited two U.S. samples: An exploratory sample through Amazon's Mechanical Turk ( N = 827, alt-right n = 447) and a larger, nationally representative sample through the National Opinion Research Center's Amerispeak panel ( N = 1,283, alt-right n = 71-160, depending on the definition). We estimate that 6% of the U.S. population and 10% of Trump voters identify as alt-right. Alt-right adherents reported a psychological profile more reflective of the desire for group-based dominance than economic anxiety. Although both the alt-right and non-alt-right Trump voters differed substantially from non-alt-right, non-Trump voters, the alt-right and Trump voters were quite similar, differing mainly in the alt-right's especially high enthusiasm for Trump, suspicion of mainstream media, trust in alternative media, and desire for collective action on behalf of Whites. We argue for renewed consideration of overt forms of bias in contemporary intergroup research.
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“Whereas conservative-rightist ideology is associated with valuing tradition, social order and maintenance of the status quo, liberal-leftist ideology is associated with a push for egalitarian social change.”
From Cognitive–motivational mechanisms of political polarization in social-communicative contexts (2022) · cites this paper as [167]
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“In addition, decades of research in political psychology demonstrate that those who embrace more conservative-rightist attitudes, identities and leaders are more authoritarian and social-dominance-oriented (that is, supportive of group-based hierarchies) than those who embrace more liberal-leftist attitudes, identities and leaders107,149,163–169.”
From Cognitive–motivational mechanisms of political polarization in social-communicative contexts (2022) · cites this paper as [167]
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Cognitive–motivational mechanisms of political polarization in social-communicative contexts
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Metadata
- Authors
- Forscher, P. S., & Kteily, N. S.
- Affiliations
- Laboratoire Inter-universitaire de Psychologie: Personnalité, Cognition, Changement Social (FR)
- Northwestern University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Forscher, Patrick S.
- Venue
- Perspectives on Psychological Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2019-11-20
- Volume
- 15
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 90-116
- ISSN
- 1745-6916 (ISSN-L)
- 1745-6924
- PMC
- PMC6980479
- OpenAlex
- W2778100822
- Cited by
- 110
- References
- 53
- Citations by year
- 2026: 11 · 2025: 11 · 2024: 11 · 2023: 15 · 2022: 20 · 2021: 19 · 2020: 9 · 2019: 8
- FWCI
- 59.09
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- doi.org
- Locations
- Perspectives on Psychological Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- PsyArXiv (OSF Preprints) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health (5R01-GM111002-02)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Populism, Right-Wing Movements
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and Political Violence
- Keywords
- alt-right, political psychology, Trump voters, 2016 US presidential election, economic anxiety, alternative media, collective action, white identity, intergroup bias
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Adult, Aged, Attitude, Female, Group Processes, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Politics, Social Dominance, United States, Young Adult, Racism
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