Abteilungskolloquium am 15. 1. 2025, Hebelstraße 10, 3. OG: Lea Lorenz & Prof. Melanie Steffens (Uni Landau): Interactions of language styles with politicans' sexual orientation and race on likeliness to vote for a candidate.

Abstract:

Ensuring thatgovernmental representation reflects societal diversity is crucial, yet women,especially Black and lesbian women, remain markedly underrepresented. The presentresearch aims to investigate the effects of intersecting identities anddifferent language styles on candidates’ political prospects. The assertivenessof one’s campaign language, or lack thereof, is an effective tool tocommunicate the type of politics voters can expect from a candidate. In an onlinerepeated-measures experiment (N = 656), we used photos and campaignmessages to manipulate the race and sexual orientation, respectively, of hypotheticalpolitical candidates in the US. Candidates’ self-presentation style wasmanipulated through their reliance on communal or assertive campaign language. Participantsindicated for each candidate for which offices they appeared suitable(traditionally masculine vs. feminine). This experiment allows us to test aseries of pre-registered hypotheses that pit against one