The effects of anti-immigrant right-wing populist ads on implicit and explicit attitudes: A moderated mediation model

Author(s)
Jörg Matthes, Desiree Schmuck
Abstract

Across Europe, the use of negative portrayals of immigrants in populist political advertising has dramatically increased. An experimental study tested the underlying mechanisms and boundary conditions for the effects of such ads on explicit and implicit attitudes toward foreigners. Findings revealed that populist ads strengthened intergroup anxiety and negative stereotypes for voters with lower educational degrees. This, in turn, led to more negative explicit attitudes. However, we observed stronger effects of populist ads on implicit attitudes for individuals with higher educational degrees. The necessity of including explicit as well as implicit measures in political communication research is discussed.

Organisation(s)
Department of Communication
Journal
Communication Research (CR)
Volume
44
Pages
556-581
No. of pages
26
ISSN
0093-6502
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1177/0093650215577859
Publication date
06-2017
Peer reviewed
Yes
Austrian Fields of Science 2012
508007 Communication science, 508014 Journalism
Keywords
ASJC Scopus subject areas
Communication, Language and Linguistics, Linguistics and Language
Portal url
https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/the-effects-of-antiimmigrant-rightwing-populist-ads-on-implicit-and-explicit-attitudes-a-moderated-mediation-model(cf94d5df-2576-4557-bbb3-494f9bd33eb1).html