PsyPost reports:

Politicians frequently use aggressive, blaming language to mobilize voters and attack opponents. Recent psychological experiments reveal that exposure to this specific style of communication causes people to feel their core values are under attack, regardless of their own political affiliation. The findings, published in Current Psychology, show that polarizing rhetoric can directly degrade a person’s willingness to grant freedom of speech to political rivals.

Political communication has increasingly fractured into hostile territory over the last several years. Across the globe, various political leaders have found success by utilizing an unconventional, confrontational style of speaking. Researchers refer to this communication style as demagogic discourse.

Demagogic discourse typically relies on three specific elements. First, it attributes blame to specific groups, actively scapegoating and targeting them as threats. Second, it discards basic political etiquette by leveling personal, morally charged insults at opponents. Third, it attacks the foundational institutions of democracy, regularly accusing the free press of distributing fake news.

Many observers assume that this type of aggressive speech actively harms the social fabric. However, empirical tests of the psychological impact of such political language have been surprisingly scarce. Marcos Dono, a researcher at the Universidade de Santiago de Compostela in Spain, and his colleagues designed a series of experiments to test these assumptions. [Continue reading…]