Comportement politique/sociologie

F21 - Political Trust and Social Divides / Confiance politique et divisions sociales

Date: Jun 5 | Heure: 03:30pm to 05:00pm | Salle:

Chair/Président/Présidente : Sophie Borwein (University of British Columbia)

Discussant/Commentateur/Commentatrice : Nadjim Fréchet (Université de Montréal)

Political Trust in Context: District-level Conditions on Trust in Candidates and Politicians: Kenny Ie (University of New Brunswick - Saint John), Joanna Everitt (University of New Brunswick - Saint John), Karen Bird (McMaster University), Angelia Wagner (University of Alberta)
Abstract: Political trust is multifaceted in both dimensions of the trust relationship: who trusts, and who is trusted. Individual-level factors such as sociodemographics, group attachments, and personality traits can impact the tendencies of people to trust in actors at multiple levels: individual candidates, politicians generally, and institutions or systems. This paper examines the ‘meso-level’ conditions within which individuals experience politics. We assess the impacts of four district characteristics – ethnic diversity, rural-urban status, electoral competitiveness, and prior presence of racialized minority candidates - on two outcomes: (1) trust in candidates and politicians, and (2) co-ethnic affinity in trust. We test for these contextual impacts both experimentally and with observational data. First, we examine assessments of local candidate trustworthiness in a conjoint design, in which respondents were presented with fictional, randomized candidate profiles. Second, we use 2021 Canadian Election Study data to assess the significance of district-level conditions on general trust in politicians.

Chapter 8: Can't We All Just Get Along?: Eric Merkley (University of Toronto)
Abstract: Scholars aren’t just worried about the political consequences of affective polarization; they are equally concerned about its toll on society. If people are increasingly hostile towards their political opponents, they are also going to be more reluctant to interact with them in their day-to-day lives—more hesitant to form friendships and relationships, less willing to engage with them in economic and social interactions, and perhaps even more likely to discriminate against them. This chapter explores these questions in the Canadian context. I present the results of a pair of conjoint experiments to provide behavioural evidence for aversion from, and discrimination towards, out-party supporters. The first asks respondents to evaluate a pair of hypothetical profiles on a dating website and indicates how interested they would be in messaging, receiving messages from, and dating or forming friendships with the people featured in the profiles. The second experiment randomly assigns respondents into one of four decision making scenarios. In two scenarios, respondents evaluate who they would prefer to have as a neighbour or in-law. In the other two scenarios, they are asked to evaluate their comfort with giving a loan to the people featured in the profiles or with hiring them to complete a home renovation project. In all scenarios respondents are given the ideology and partisan identity of the people featured in the profiles, their demographics, and an attribute that is directly pertinent to the decision in question (e.g., the credit score in the loan scenario).

Beyond Good Intentions: Cognitive and Affective Empathy’s Divergent Effects on Political Animosity: Thomas Bergeron (University of Toronto), Eric Merkley (University of Toronto), Thomas Galipeau (University of Toronto)
Abstract: This study examines the complex role of empathy in shaping political polarization, addressing the tension between empathy’s prosocial potential and its parochial limitations in reducing partisan animosity. Empathy is not a uniform construct; it is multifaceted. Cognitive empathy (perspective-taking) promotes understanding and can mitigate out-group bias, whereas affective empathy (empathic concern) may reinforce in-group favouritism, thereby heightening affective polarization. Our theoretical framework distinguishes empathy’s cognitive and affective dimensions, as well as the differences between trait-based empathy and state-driven empathy shaped by context. Contrary to mainstream approaches to affective polarization, we differentiate between its two poles: in-group affection and out-group animosity. Correlations from Canadian and American samples suggest that cognitive empathy predicts warmer attitudes toward political out-groups, reducing affective polarization. A survey experiment in the United States further tests this relationship. It reveals that perspective-taking priming increases warmth toward political out-groups but has a limited effect on reducing social distance measures of affective polarization. These findings highlight the nuanced impact of empathy on political polarization. While fostering perspective-taking can lessen animosity, it may not fully bridge deeper social divides. This study contributes to political psychology by underscoring the context-sensitive and component-specific effects of empathy on partisan hostility, offering insights for potential interventions to reduce polarization.

Election Outcomes and Social Trust: Mark Williamson (Toronto Metropolitan University)
Abstract: Extensive research has shown that after an election, people who supported the winning party express greater levels of trust in political institutions than those who supported losing parties. In the existing literature on this “sore loser” effect, social trust – a general trust in other members of society -- has received little attention. Social trust is often assumed not to fluctuate at the individual level based on contextual factors, like which political party wins or loses the election. We argue this is an oversight: election outcomes are often perceived by voters as signals about several dimensions of trust, including the competency, values and animosity of their fellow citizens. Using Canadian Election Study data from 2004 to 2021, we show that voters who supported the winning party express greater levels of social trust after the election. We provide evidence for a causal interpretation to this relationship by comparing voters supporting winning and losing parties in electoral districts where the result was especially close. We also find that negative reactions to losing are particularly strong among those who initially expected their party to win and those with a stronger pre-election dislike for the out-party. Taken together, these results highlight the broader social impacts of political processes and raise concerns about how partisan antipathy threatens the health of our democracy.