Highlighting Similarities between Political Parties Reduced Perceived Disagreement on Global Warming

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper explores how an alternative media narrative of general partisan agreement can spill over onto individuals’ perceptions of how much partisan groups agree on specific issues. Consistent with the idea that a media narrative emphasizing partisan differences leads individuals to hold inaccurate views of what partisans think, recent national probability sample surveys showed that Americans inaccurately perceived that most Democrats and most Republicans held opposing beliefs about whether global warming has been occurring when, in fact, the majorities of both parties agree that the world is warming. To determine if an alternative narrative can rectify this misperception, experiments that exposed some participants to a message highlighting areas in which Democrats and Republicans agree were embedded in a series of non-probability sample surveys (Study 1, N =1,000; Study 2, N = 3,007). Study 1 demonstrates that this alternative narrative, compared to a narrative highlighting disagreement, leads people to perceive more Republicans to think that the world has been warming and, in turn, a decreased partisan gap on the issue. Study 2 replicates these findings and provides evidence that respondents enter the study already exposed to a narrative emphasizing disagreement. Mediation analyses of both studies suggest that the alternative narrative can indirectly lead Republican respondents to express the belief that global warming exists via updating their perceptions of what co-partisans think. Thus, a narrative emphasizing the ways in which partisans agree rather than disagree can help address the misperception that Republicans and Democrats hold opposing beliefs on global warming.