Beauty and Negativity at the Ballot Box: Effects of Negative Political Advertising and Attractiveness on Candidate Evaluation

• In Event: Information Effects in Political Campaigns: Lessons From the US

Abstract

Research on the attractiveness stereotype has found that people who are considered attractive receive higher evaluations on several trait dimensions as compared to unattractive people. This finding was shown on several social contexts, such as politics, donations, and imprisonment sentences. The purpose of this research is to investigate how physical attractiveness of a political candidate interacts with the valence (negative vs. positive) of the message he delivers and examine how these factors affect his evaluation, vote intention, and trustworthiness of the information he delivers. In particular, we are interested in investigating the conditions under which negative political advertising and physical attractiveness might be beneficial or detrimental to political candidates and the image they portray to voters.

Author

• Juliana Fernandes, U of Miami