Effects of Right-Wing Populist Political Advertising on Implicit and Explicit Stereotypes

Abstract

Abstract. We investigated the effects of antiforeigner political advertisements on implicit and explicit stereotypes. While stereotypical associations may become automatically activated (implicit stereotypes), individuals can reject these thoughts and decide not to use them for an overtly expressed judgment (explicit stereotypes). We hypothesized that even if citizens negated stereotypical content, advertisements might still affect implicit stereotypes. This hypothesis was tested using an experiment where participants (N = 186) were exposed to zero, two, four, or six stereotypical advertisements. The results showed that stereotypical advertisements did not influence explicit stereotypes but did influence implicit stereotypes, even in critical recipients who negated the stereotypical content.

Negative Stereotypical Portrayals of Muslims in Right-Wing Populist Campaigns: Perceived Discrimination, Social Identity Threats, and Hostility Among Young Muslim Adults

“…However, as European right‐wing populist campaigns make salient the distinction between national majority members and Muslims, we believe that measuring attitudes toward Austrians in general is a more appropriate measurement than attitudes toward Christians. Future research should also take into account measurements of implicit attitudes toward majority members (see Arendt, Marquart, & Matthes, ; Ellithorpe, Ewoldsen, & Velez, ; Matthes & Schmuck, 2017).…”

Voting “Against Islamization”? How Anti‐Islamic Right‐Wing, Populist Political Campaign Ads Influence Explicit and Implicit Attitudes Toward Muslims as Well as Voting Preferences

“…Taking implicit attitudes toward Muslims into account is of crucial importance, as implicit attitudes have been found to predict spontaneous reactions and social behavior, which may contribute to discrimination and hate crimes against Muslims in Western nations (Friese, Hofmann, & Schmitt, ; Strack, Werth, & Deutsch, ). In the context of racial attitudes, there is first evidence that right‐wing, populist political posters may strengthen negative implicit attitudes, while explicit racial attitudes are often suppressed (e.g., Arendt, Marquart, & Matthes, ; Matthes & Schmuck, ; see also Huber & Lapinski, ). Yet, findings from studies investigating racial attitudes in response to political campaign poster ads may not necessarily apply to anti‐Muslim attitudes as well.…”

“…Studies examining exposure to stereotypical video games (Saleem & Anderson, ) or news reports on terrorism (Das, Bushman, Bezemer, Kerkhof, & Vermeulen, ) observed increased implicit attitudes toward Muslims in response to these media stimuli. First research evidence in the field of political poster advertising further indicates that exposure to right‐wing, populist campaign poster ads increases implicit anti‐immigrant attitudes (Arendt et al, , Matthes & Schmuck, ). This effect may be explained by a political poster’s role to serve as a situational cue, which enhances the salience of “evil” outgroups that pose a threat to society (Reinemann et al, ).…”

“…This effect may be explained by a political poster’s role to serve as a situational cue, which enhances the salience of “evil” outgroups that pose a threat to society (Reinemann et al, ). That is, exposure to these poster ads may strengthen automatic affective associations between the attitude object “Muslim” and negative attributes such as “terrorist” (Arendt et al, ). Based on this reasoning, we proposed that:

H1 : Exposure to right‐wing, populist poster ads enhances negative implicit attitudes toward Muslims.

…”

“…The suppression of individuals’ automatic evaluations as a basis for explicit attitudes may explain the typically low correspondence between implicit and explicit attitudes found in previous research (e.g., Hofmann, Gawronski, Gschwendner, Le, & Schmitt, ). In particular, empirical research dealing with socially sensitive topics such as race prejudice (Fazio & Olson, ) or anti‐immigrant attitudes (Arendt et al, ; Matthes & Schmuck, ) has demonstrated discrepancies between implicit and explicit measures.…”