Racial Salience Ignites Anger Among Trump Supporters But Not Opponents

Experimental Methods Field Experiment Housing Policy Policy Preferencesracial saliencepolitical attitude moderationPolitical Behavior @R&P 2 Stata files Dataverse

Introduction

Recent studies suggest a link between racial animosity and political support for Donald Trump. This research delves deeper using experimental methods.

Experimental Insights

Our experiment exposed white participants to different racial cues while considering their views on Trump:

When encountering a Black man in housing policy context, random control trial showed stark differences based on political stance
🔷 Among strong Trump supporters, exposure increased opposition and anger toward policies
🔷 Conversely, those with negative opinions of Trump were unaffected by the same racial cues

Policy Implications

These findings offer new understanding about how racial factors influence political decision-making among different voter groups. They highlight divergent reactions to politically salient race cues between Trump supporters and opponents.

Article card for article: Supporters and Opponents of Donald Trump Respond Differently to Racial Cues: An Experimental Analysis

Supporters and Opponents of Donald Trump Respond Differently to Racial Cues: An Experimental Analysis was authored by Matthew Luttig, Christopher M. Federico and Howard G. Lavine. It was published by Sage in R&P in 2017.