There is considerable disagreement among scholars as to whether social media fuels polarization in society. However, a few have considered the possibility that polarization may instead affect social media usage. To address this gap, the study uses Dutch panel data to test directionality in the relationship between social media use and affective polarization. No support was found for the hypothesis that social media use contributed to the level of affective polarization. Instead, the results lend support to the hypothesis that it was the level of affective polarization that affected subsequent use of social media. The results furthermore reveal heterogeneous patterns among individuals, depending on their previous level of social media usage, and across different social media platforms. The study gives reason to call into question the predominating assumption in previous research that social media is a major driver of polarization in society.

A central notion among green political theorists is that deliberative engagement enhances environmental values. Despite the centrality of this claim within green political theory, there is a lack of empirical research evaluating its promise outside formal deliberative forums. Here, an empirical large-N study is provided that tests whether everyday political discussion between individuals of different political orientations is positively associated with stronger pro-environmental attitudes in the US. The main finding is that individuals who engaged in this type of cross-cutting discussion reported significantly stronger proenvironmental attitudes compared to individuals who did not engage in this type of discussion. Moreover, the association remained positive for different clusters of individuals regardless of political engagement, party affiliation, or socio-demographics. KEYWORDS Deliberation; cross-cutting discussions; green political theory; environmental attitudes and values; de-polarization CONTACT Maria Nordbrandt

Despite its potentially pernicious consequences for social relations and democracy, the study of affective polarization has only recently proliferated. Thus, the reasons driving this development—or its consequences—are not yet adequately understood. This article addresses the role of one specific factor frequently discussed in both academic and popular debate—namely, the role of crosscutting communication among people of different political leanings. It is a longstanding notion that crosscutting communication is crucial to overcoming the prejudice, polarization, and attitudinal biases brought on by streamlined information diets. However, there is empirical evidence to suggest that crosscutting experiences sometimes elevate polarization—especially when individuals also have access to like-minded views and when disagreement is perceived as intense. The study sheds light on the connection by testing hypotheses about the association between crosscutting communication and affective polarization in both offline and online modalities of political communication. The empirical analyses were based on panel data from the E-DEM project covering a random sample of Spanish citizens interviewed up to three times between November 2018 and May 2019—that is, the time running up to the Spanish national election in 2019. The results suggest that individuals who reported engagement in face-to-face discussions with supporters of various parties (crosscutting discussions) during this time reported significantly lower levels of affective polarization compared to engagement in discussions with co-partisans exclusively. Online crosscutting and consensual discussion experiences, however, were linked to comparable levels of anti-out-group sentiment, suggesting that concerns about the impact of online communication being different from offline communication in general—and perhaps more harmful—may be overstated. Descriptive evidence furthermore indicates that most respondents who engaged in political discussions had experiences of discussions with both co-partisans and supporters of opposing parties rather than co-partisans exclusively. Again, this was true for offline and online communication alike. Insofar as the results translate to other contexts as well, they indicate that future efforts to explain any surges in affective polarization should primarily be focused on other areas of inquiry.