Andrzej Falkowski

Political Branding: Political Candidates Positioning Based on Inter-Object Associative Affinity Index

The article presents the conception of positioning politicians based on a three-stage approach to political branding. The main assumption is that a political brand—and politicians image as its crucial component—is conceptualized as consisting of a node in memory to which a variety of associations are linked. These associations—positive, negative, or neutral—must be shared with other rival candidates as well as with an prototypical ideal candidate, understood as a model and standard of comparison while developing detailed marketing strategies. One of the most valuable methods that has been used to measure these associations is associative overlap technique developed by Szalay. This measure is based on free verbal associations and it expresses the degree of similarity among objects (words, persons, groups) based on the number of similar responses (associations) they elicit in common. The first stage of branding, candidates’ positioning in various segments of voters, focuses on such affinity between politicians and is based on multidimensional scaling techniques. At the second stage, mutual relationships between particular elements (positive and negative, common and distinctive), of which a politicians image consists, are defined. The third level of political branding links the results of positioning to voters’ decisions. This framework of branding political candidates is presented on the basis of empirical research focused on Polish presidential candidates’ perception and evaluation in the 2005 presidential election. The results of the performed research show that it is not only the strengthening of politicians’ positive features but also neutralizing the negative ones that contributes to his higher expected quality.

Morality and Competence in Shaping the Images of Political Leaders

Psychological models of forming impressions about other people assume that this process is strictly connected with social categorization. Therefore, it is clear that the results of many studies show that the evaluations of other people are based on two crucial and separable criteria: morality and competence. Obviously morality and competence are two fundamental and distinct dimensions of the perception of politicians. These dimensions substantially influence voters’ behavior toward politicians and are clearly visible both in the preelection polls as well as in the scientific analyses concerning forming the images of politicians. The evaluations of politicians on the morality and competence dimensions are central in forming the interpersonal attitudes in which the dominant elements are affect and respect toward the evaluated person. Consequently, affect and respect are crucial factors in establishing the support of candidates for political offices. The morality and competence dimensions trigger the causal structures in the voters mind in which formed attitude creates affect and respect, which determine voting behavior.

Crisis Management: Government Strategy in Framing Reform Proposals and Communications

One of the key determinants of the popularity of politicians is keeping election pledges, which promises voters’ satisfaction and ensures their backing for those in power. Economic slowdowns and social and political crises are the most challenging periods in terms of retaining or boosting popularity. To face up to such dire circumstances, authorities seek to pass through drastic reforms affecting either all or some selected groups of voters. Based on Polish examples, the empirical studies presented herein demonstrate such strategies of governance and the creation of such electoral political messages that help maintain the popularity of the government or, at least, materially alleviate the negative consequences of introduced, yet unpopular reforms. The strategies rest upon regularities derived from the prospect theory concerning the linking of negative events in the minimizing of dissatisfaction and the separation of positive events in the maximizing of satisfaction. The investigated hypothesis covers the internal consistency of different but negative information about unpopular reforms. For it is not enough to combine negative events with a view to reducing the negative emotions in political messages. The effect of such a reduction will only be guaranteed when the linked events are perceived as consistent by voters.

Positive–Negative Asymmetry in the Evaluations of Political Candidates. The Role of Features of Similarity and Affect in Voter Behavior

In this study we followed the extension of Tversky’s research about features of similarity with its application to open sets. Unlike the original closed-set model in which a feature was shifted between a common and a distinctive set, we investigated how addition of new features and deletion of existing features affected similarity judgments. The model was tested empirically in a political context and we analyzed how positive and negative changes in a candidate’s profile affect the similarity of the politician to his or her ideal and opposite counterpart. The results showed a positive–negative asymmetry in comparison judgments where enhancing negative features (distinctive for an ideal political candidate) had a greater effect on judgments than operations on positive (common) features. However, the effect was not observed for comparisons to a bad politician. Further analyses showed that in the case of a negative reference point, the relationship between similarity judgments and voting intention was mediated by the affective evaluation of the candidate.

External and Internal Context in the Coherence of Advertisement: An Empirical Study on the Affect to the Ad and Brand

Advertisements never appear in isolation, instead, they are always embedded in a specific context. On the one hand, advertisements have a specific external context, which is what surrounds the ad (the content of the magazine, TV program, website content), and this external context determines how ads are perceived, evaluated or remembered (Segev et al., 2014; Janssens et al., 2012; Dahlen et al., 2008; Lee and Thorson, 2008; Dahlen and Lange, 2004; De Pelsmacker et al., 2002).

Backward Framing and Memory Evaluation in Political Elections

Results of a backward framing study have proven the feasibility of reconstructing memories of knowledge acquired directly or indirectly by experience or by verbal description under the influence of a later-read opinion. Subjects in a study (N = 232) were initially given a description of a politician and then asked to evaluate various aspects of the candidates image: program, personality, and physical appearance. A week later, they read a positive or negative opinion of the politician and were asked to recall their earlier evaluations. The obtained result shows that the core structure of a politicians image is based on his or her election policy, which is congruent with the economical approach to voter behavior. The recalled information of a specific event can actually be successfully manipulated by a following event, which results in subjects being convinced that their changed opinion is actually the opinion they had initially. This proves that backward framing in the constructing of political reality is a tool that can be used for creation of a false image of a politician which is imprinted in the memory of a voter.