The Personality Origins of Positive and Negative Partisanship

Abstract

Negative partisanship describes the intense disdain for a rival political party. A growing number of political scientists in the US and beyond examine the impact of negative partisanship on citizens’ political behavior, asserting the notion that negative partisanship exerts a strong influence, either on its own or in combination with positive partisanship. Yet we know little about the psychological origins of negative and positive partisanship: Which personality traits are associated with high levels of negative partisanship, and do they differ from the ones that have been linked to positive partisanship? In this article, I address these questions. Utilizing a sample of US adults and a sample of Swedish adults, I examine the influence of prominent personality traits—including Authoritarianism, Social Dominance Orientation, the Need for Closure, and the Big Five—on strong negative and positive partisanship. I demonstrate that the personality origins of positive and negative partisanship differ not just across the two samples but also across partisans on the left and on the right. I conclude the article with implications for research on polarization and a plea for more comparative work on (positive and negative) partisanship.