Why Like-Minded Political Incivility Reduces Affective Polarization

• In Event: Polarization and Remedies

Brief Overview

Survey experiments reveal that political elites’ use of incivility in social media postings increases positive affect for the partisan out-group among like-minded partisans. This is motivated by group-level guilt for attacks deemed excessive.

Author

• Bryan T. Gervais, The University of Texas at San Antonio