Effects of ideology and political sophistication on language use among
U.S. citizens and members of Congress
Joanna Sterling | Department of Psychology and Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton
University
John T. Jost | Department of Psychology, New York University
We analyzed Twitter language to explore hypotheses derived from moral foundations
theory, which suggests that liberals and conservatives prioritize different
values. In Study 1, we captured 11
million tweets from nearly 25,000 U.S. residents and observed that liberals
expressed fairness concerns more often than conservatives, whereas conservatives
were more likely to express concerns about group loyalty, authority, and purity.
Increasing political sophistication exacerbated ideological differences in
authority and group loyalty. At low levels of sophistication, liberals used more
harm language, but at high levels of sophistication conservatives referenced
harm more often. In Study 2, we
analyzed 59,000 tweets from 388 members of the U.S. Congress. Liberal
legislators used more fairness- and harm-related words, whereas conservative
legislators used more authority-related words. Unexpectedly, liberal legislators
used more language pertaining to group loyalty and purity. Follow-up analyses
suggest that liberals and conservatives in Congress use similar words to
emphasize different policy priorities.
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