Howard Lavine

On the Varieties of National Attachment: Blind Versus Constructive Patriotism

Two studies explored a theoretical distinction between “blind” and “constructive” patriotism. Blind patriotism is defined as an attachment to country characterized by unquestioning positive evaluation, staunch allegiance, and intolerance of criticism. Constructive patriotism is defined as an attachment to country characterized by support for questioning and criticism of current group practices that are intended to result in positive change. Items designed to investigate these dimensions of national attachment were administered to two groups of undergraduates in separate surveys. Measures of the two constructs derived from factor analysis of the responses proved to be reliable and valid. Blind patriotism was positively associated with political disengagement, nationalism, perceptions of foreign threat, perceived importance of symbolic behaviors, and selective exposure to pro-U.S. information. In contrast, constructive patriotism was positively associated with multiple indicators of political involvement, including political efficacy, interest, knowledge, and behavior. The implications of this distinction for theory and research on patriotism are discussed.

Depicting Women as Sex Objects in Television Advertising: Effects on Body Dissatisfaction

This study examined whether exposure to TV ads that portray women as sex objects causes increased body dissatisfaction among women and men. Participants were exposed to 15 sexist and 5 nonsexist ads, 20 nonsexist ads, or a no ad control condition. Results revealed that women exposed to sexist ads judged their current body size as larger and revealed a larger discrepancy between their actual and ideal body sizes (preferring a thinner body) than women exposed to the nonsexist or no ad condition. Men exposed to the sexist ads judged their current body size as thinner, revealed a larger discrepancy between their actual and ideal body size (preferring a larger body), and revealed a larger discrepancy between their own ideal body size and their perceptions of others’ male body size preferences (believing that others preferred a larger ideal) than men exposed to the nonsexist or no ad condition. Discussion focuses on the cognitive, attitudinal, and behavioral consequences of exposure to gender stereotypic television advertising.

Ambivalence, information, and electoral choice

Conventional wisdom views voter choice in House elections as preordained by party identification, incumbency, and perceptions of national conditions. In an analysis of voter behavior in House elections between 1990 and 2000, we find instead that voters are quite heterogeneous. Voters who hold ambivalent partisan attitudes, who typically constitute 30% of the electorate, reduce their reliance on party identification; this effect is entirely independent of the strength of identification. Individuals holding ambivalent partisan attitudes that both lack political knowledge and are presented with little campaign stimulus are more likely to engage in economic voting. Individuals holding ambivalent partisan attitudes that either are knowledgeable about politics or are presented with stimulating campaigns are more likely to engage in ideological voting. Thus, campaign competition and national partisan competition each play a role in assuring that ordinary voters may participate meaningfully in the political process.

On the Relationship Between Attitude Involvement and Attitude Accessibility: Toward a Cognitive-Motivational Model of Political Information Processing

A model of the relationship between attitude involvement and attitude accessibilitywas developed and tested. The model specifies that attitude involvement leads to selective(biased) issue-related information-gathering strategies, which in turn produce extreme andunivalent (unambivalent) attitudes. Finally, attitudes associated with univalent and extremeunderlying structures should occasion relatively little decision conflict and thus should be highlyaccessible. Questionnaire response data gathered in a national telephone survey and from twosamples of undergraduates revealed that both attitude extremity and attitude ambivalence onselected political issues mediated the relationship between attitude involvement and attitudeaccessibility. Some findings indicated that selective processing mediated the relationshipbetween attitude involvement and attitude extremity and ambivalence. Discussion focuses on theprocesses linking involvement to accessibility, the factors that moderate theambivalence-accessibility relationship, and the relevance of the model to media-based primingeffects and tothe nature of public opinion and the survey response.

The moderating influence of attitude strength on the susceptibility to context effects in attitude surveys

In 3 experiments, the authors assessed whether attitude strength moderates the susceptibility of attitudes to item context effects in surveys. In Experiment 1, respondents completed multiple measures of attitude strength. Three weeks later, respondents participated in a context experiment. Results revealed that respondents with weak attitudes exhibited significantly larger context effect for 1 of 2 issues. In Experiment 2, the results of Experiment l were conceptually replicated by use of measures of interattitudinal embeddedness to assess attitude strength. In Experiment 3, significant strength-moderated context effects were found when attitude strength was assessed in a multi-item, multidimensional manner but not when it was assessed with a single item. Discussion focuses on measurement and theoretical issues related to the moderation and mediation of context effects in attitude surveys.

Threat, Authoritarianism, and Voting: An Investigation of Personality and Persuasion

The authors examined whether the influence of persuasive messages emphasizing reward versus threat was moderated by authoritarianism. Five days before the 1996 presidential election, participants (N = 86) received either a reward-related message (emphasizing the positive benefits of voting) or a threatrelated message (emphasizing the negative consequences of failing to vote) recommending that they vote in the election. We found that high authoritarians perceived the threat message as stronger in argument quality than the reward message, and low authoritarians perceived the reward message as stronger in argument quality than the threat message. In turn, subjective perceptions of message quality exerted a direct influence on participants’ postmessage attitudes toward voting in the election. Finally, behavioral intentions mediated the influence of voting attitudes on actual voting behavior. Discussion focuses on the implications of the message frame and authoritarianism.

The relationship of national and personal issue salience to attitude accessibility on foreign and domestic policy issues

Research on issue voting indicates that the impact of a given attitude on the candidate appraisal process depends on its personal importance or salience (e.g., Krosnick, 1988). In the present research, we suggest that salient attitudes may be more influential because they are more cognitively accessible in memory relative to less salient attitudes. Results based on within-subject, between-issue comparisons indicate that individuals have more accessible attitudes toward issues that are highly salient to them than toward issues that are relatively less salient. Results also indicate that attitude accessibility is more closely associated with the personal importance of an issue than with the perceived national importance of an issue. Finally, in applying this accessibility analysis to the debate on the relative electoral influence offoreign versus domestic issues, we find that attitudes on the latter are more accessible and more likely to arouse self-interest. Discussion focuses on developing process models of political cognition and behavior, and on the utility of accessibility theory in providing insights into these processes.

Issues, Party and Character: The Moderating Role of Ideological Thinking on Candidate Evaluation

We examine ‘heuristic’ and ‘systematic’ candidate-appraisal strategies within a presidential election context. Controlling for political knowledge, we determine whether individual differences in the capacity for ideological thought condition voters’ reliance on the major determinants of candidate choice, increasing reliance on policy considerations and decreasing reliance on the heuristic cue of party identification and on perceptions of candidate character when ideological capacity is high, and exerting the opposite effect – decreasing the role of issues and increasing the role of party identification and candidate qualities – when such capacity is low. Using American National Election Studies data from the 1984–2000 period, we find that ideological thinking consistently heightens voters’ reliance on issues and decreases their reliance on candidate cues, but only among voters who report being concerned about the outcome of the election. In contrast, the effect of partisanship is stable across levels of ideological thinking and concern about the campaign. We discuss the cognitive processes by which ideological thinking regulates political choice, and assert its centrality in the political decision-making process.

The Relationship between Self-Discrepancies and Affective States: The Moderating Roles of Self-Monitoring and Standpoints on the Self

Using self-discrepancy theory as a theoretical framework, this study examines the interactive effects of self-monitoring and type of self-guide (i.e., own vs. other standpoint) on the relationship between self-discrepancies and affective states. Over two sessions, 294 undergraduates completed the Self-Monitoring Scale, the Selves Questionnaire (either from the own or other standpoint), the Beck Depression Inventory, the Hopkins Symptom Checklist, and the Social Anxiety subscale of the Self-Consciousness Scale. For low self-monitors, depression and anxiety were predicted only by self-discrepancies from the own standpoint on the self. For high self-monitors, depression and anxiety were more strongly predicted by self-discrepancies from the other than the own standpoint on the self. The authors discuss the role of individual differences in understanding when self-discrepancies have implications for individuals’ affective states.

Group Ambivalence and Electoral Decision-Making

Recent insights about attitude structure and process have spawned a new understanding of the nature and dynamics of mass opinion. On the structural side, there is mounting evidence that political opinions are more complex than the unidimensional summary statements (e.g., unfavorable or favorable, cold or warm, negative or positive) routinely used to measure them. On the processing side, opinions often are not directly retrieved from memory in summary form but, instead, are constructed episodically on the basis of an “on-the-spot” memory search using whatever considerations are momentarily salient (Tourangeau, Rips, and Rasinski 2000; Zaller and Feldman 1992; but see Lodge, McGraw, and Stroh 1989; Lodge, Steenbergen, and Brau 1995). Although political scientists have only recently begun to incorporate these insights into empirical models of political behavior, they have long recognized that opinions are infused with conflicting beliefs and feelings. The authors of The American Voter wrote, for example, that an individual voter’s “system of partisan attitudes” could be consistently favorable toward one party, or that the elements of the system could be in conflict (Campbell et al. 1960; also see Free and Cantril 1967; Lazarsfeld, Berelson, and Gaudet 1944). Contemporary research suggests further that ambivalence—an internalized conflict about a specific political choice—is a prevalent characteristic of political belief systems, with important implications for how citizens make political decisions.