Who values competent minds and who likes warm hearts? The role of right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation in shaping voter preferences for political candidates
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Abstract
Decades of research have recognized political candidates' competence and warmth as predictors of voter preferences, but to whom these distinct personalities are most appealing remains unclear. In the current research, we investigated how voters' Right-Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) and Social Dominance Orientation (SDO) influenced their preferences for highly competent or warm political candidates. In two studies, we experimentally manipulated candidate competence (Study 1) and warmth (Study 2) and measured voter preferences using overall evaluations, the feeling thermometer, and the likelihood-of-voting rating. We also measured perceived ability to clean up danger, perceived ability to win competitions, and perceived caring about people as potential mediators. The results suggested that a candidate's high competence (vs. neutral traits) increased preferences for the candidate among voters high in RWA more than those low in RWA. However, despite some indication, the effect that a candidate's high warmth (vs. neutral traits) increased such preferences among voters low in RWA more than those high in RWA lacked robustness across different voting preference measures. Additionally, the moderating effects of SDO on the relationships between candidate traits and voter preferences were not significant. Neither RWA nor SDO moderated the indirect effects of candidate competence and warmth through the proposed mediators.
期刊介绍：
The British Journal of Social Psychology publishes work from scholars based in all parts of the world, and manuscripts that present data on a wide range of populations inside and outside the UK. It publishes original papers in all areas of social psychology including: • social cognition • attitudes • group processes • social influence • intergroup relations • self and identity • nonverbal communication • social psychological aspects of personality, affect and emotion • language and discourse Submissions addressing these topics from a variety of approaches and methods, both quantitative and qualitative are welcomed. We publish papers of the following kinds: • empirical papers that address theoretical issues; • theoretical papers, including analyses of existing social psychological theories and presentations of theoretical innovations, extensions, or integrations; • review papers that provide an evaluation of work within a given area of social psychology and that present proposals for further research in that area; • methodological papers concerning issues that are particularly relevant to a wide range of social psychologists; • an invited agenda article as the first article in the first part of every volume. The editorial team aims to handle papers as efficiently as possible. In 2016, papers were triaged within less than a week, and the average turnaround time from receipt of the manuscript to first decision sent back to the authors was 47 days.
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