Affective Polarization Did Not Increase During the Coronavirus Pandemic
Open accessAbstract
We document trends in affective polarization during the COVID-19 pandemic. In our main measure, affective polarization is relatively flat between July 2019 and February 2020, then falls significantly around the onset of the pandemic. Three of five other data sources display a similar downward trend, with two of five data sources showing no significant change. A survey experiment shows that priming respondents to think about the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic significantly reduces affective polarization.
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Emphasizing a superordinate national identity can reduce out-group animus as well as affective and ideological polarization.
“emphasizing a superordinate national identity can reduce out-group animus as well as affective and ideological polarization281–283, consistent with social identity theory90,92,139.”
From Cognitive–motivational mechanisms of political polarization in social-communicative contexts (2022) · cites this paper as [283]
Section 2.2 reports that a coronavirus prime improved feelings toward the opposing party and reduced affective polarization. The Discussion proposes a new sense of national unity as a possible mechanism, but the experiment did not isolate an emphasis on national identity, and the paper does not report a reduction in ideological polarization. Page numbers are unavailable in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.87)
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- Authors
- Boxell, L., Conway, J., Druckman, J. N., & Gentzkow, M.
- Affiliations
- Stanford University (US)
- Northwestern University (US)
- National Bureau of Economic Research (US)
- Venue
- SSRN Electronic Journal
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2021
- Volume
- 17
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 491-512
- ISSN
- 1554-0626 (ISSN-L)
- 1556-5068
- OpenAlex
- W4287987789
- Cited by
- 35
- References
- 39
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 10 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 2
- FWCI
- 16.88
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- doi.org
- Locations
- Quarterly Journal of Political Science (publishedVersion)
- SSRN Electronic Journal (publishedVersion)
- National Bureau of Economic Research (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- OSF Preprints (OSF Preprints) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation (DGE-165651 8, 1656518)
- Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
- John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
- Northwestern University
- Institute for Humane Studies, George Mason University
- Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Electoral Systems and Political Participation
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Media Influence and Politics
- Social Sciences › Communication › Social Media and Politics
- Keywords
- affective polarization, COVID-19 pandemic, political attitudes, partisan attitudes, survey experiment, priming, public opinion trends
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