No Additional Evidence that Proximity to the July 4th Holiday Affects Affective Polarization

One promising approach for reducing affective polarization is priming a shared American identity and one promising event to prime that identity is the 4th of July. Prior work showed that proximity to the 4th of July reduced affective polarization. We conceptually replicated this study using a 9-wave...

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Main Authors: Mark J. Brandt, Felicity M. Turner-Zwinkels
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: University of California Press 2020-07-01
Series:Collabra: Psychology
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.collabra.org/articles/368
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author Mark J. Brandt
Felicity M. Turner-Zwinkels
author_facet Mark J. Brandt
Felicity M. Turner-Zwinkels
author_sort Mark J. Brandt
collection DOAJ
description One promising approach for reducing affective polarization is priming a shared American identity and one promising event to prime that identity is the 4th of July. Prior work showed that proximity to the 4th of July reduced affective polarization. We conceptually replicated this study using a 9-wave longitudinal design in 2019. We found no short-term or long-term effects of the 4th of July on social distance from partisan and ideological ingroups or outgroups. Notably, our within-subjects design was able to identify the existence of individual differences in social distance trajectories across time, but there were not individual differences in short-terms changes in social distance in close proximity to the 4th of July. Additional analyses, did not find consistent predictors of these individual differences, suggesting a clear gap for future studies. Although priming a shared American identity may be effective, these findings suggest that the salutary effects of the 4th of July holiday do not emerge in 2019.
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spelling doaj.art-6f902b5a2f5d476f9278dff55a0077072022-12-21T19:33:03ZengUniversity of California PressCollabra: Psychology2474-73942020-07-016110.1525/collabra.368208No Additional Evidence that Proximity to the July 4th Holiday Affects Affective PolarizationMark J. Brandt0Felicity M. Turner-Zwinkels1Tilburg UniversityTilburg UniversityOne promising approach for reducing affective polarization is priming a shared American identity and one promising event to prime that identity is the 4th of July. Prior work showed that proximity to the 4th of July reduced affective polarization. We conceptually replicated this study using a 9-wave longitudinal design in 2019. We found no short-term or long-term effects of the 4th of July on social distance from partisan and ideological ingroups or outgroups. Notably, our within-subjects design was able to identify the existence of individual differences in social distance trajectories across time, but there were not individual differences in short-terms changes in social distance in close proximity to the 4th of July. Additional analyses, did not find consistent predictors of these individual differences, suggesting a clear gap for future studies. Although priming a shared American identity may be effective, these findings suggest that the salutary effects of the 4th of July holiday do not emerge in 2019.https://www.collabra.org/articles/368affective polarizationpolitical prejudicecommon ingroup identityjuly 4th
spellingShingle Mark J. Brandt
Felicity M. Turner-Zwinkels
No Additional Evidence that Proximity to the July 4th Holiday Affects Affective Polarization
Collabra: Psychology
affective polarization
political prejudice
common ingroup identity
july 4th
title No Additional Evidence that Proximity to the July 4th Holiday Affects Affective Polarization
title_full No Additional Evidence that Proximity to the July 4th Holiday Affects Affective Polarization
title_fullStr No Additional Evidence that Proximity to the July 4th Holiday Affects Affective Polarization
title_full_unstemmed No Additional Evidence that Proximity to the July 4th Holiday Affects Affective Polarization
title_short No Additional Evidence that Proximity to the July 4th Holiday Affects Affective Polarization
title_sort no additional evidence that proximity to the july 4th holiday affects affective polarization
topic affective polarization
political prejudice
common ingroup identity
july 4th
url https://www.collabra.org/articles/368
work_keys_str_mv AT markjbrandt noadditionalevidencethatproximitytothejuly4thholidayaffectsaffectivepolarization
AT felicitymturnerzwinkels noadditionalevidencethatproximitytothejuly4thholidayaffectsaffectivepolarization