A Ride on the Trump Train: Using Affective Intelligence Theory to Understand how Source Cues Effect Emotional Responses to Policy Positions
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2022-04-29
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Political Science
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Public Domain Mark 1.0
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Abstract
To what effect does Donald Trump have on emotions and opinion formation? Emotions have been shown to strongly influence an individual's thoughts, actions, and evaluation. Elite cues have been increasingly used by the masses to make and form judgements on political issues, which can influence how an individual reacts, emotionally, to a situation. The theory of Affective Intelligence proposes that the emotions of anger, anxiety (fear) and enthusiasm predict how an individual will act in a political situation. Using this theory, and these emotions, I conduct a survey with an experimental manipulation to examine how people react differently, emotionally to a quote that is attributed to Donald Trump, versus when it is attributed to a politician. I find that Trump has little effect on overall emotional responses, which I attribute to his lack of current formal political power. Yet, I do find some support for my hypothesis that stronger partisans will feel more strongly towards a quote than weaker partisans on one single quote, which I attribute to a secondary source cue in the quote.