Subscribe
The latest psychology and neuroscience discoveries.
My Account
  • Mental Health
  • Social Psychology
  • Cognitive Science
  • Psychopharmacology
No Result
View All Result
PsyPost
PsyPost
No Result
View All Result
Home Exclusive Social Psychology Political Psychology

Republicans and Democrats feel “grossed out” and “nauseated” by each other

by Eric W. Dolan
February 9, 2022
in Political Psychology

Enhance your understanding of the human mind and mental health trends. Click here to follow PsyPost on LinkedIn.
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

Democrats perceive faces labeled as Republicans as physically disgusting and vice versa, according to new research published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. The findings indicate that political outgroup members can induce feelings of both disgust and anger among partisans.

Disgust is believed to be part of the behavioral immune system, which protects people from infectious disease by creating an aversion to potential pathogens. The emotional state has also been connected with discriminatory behaviors.

“Most of my research is about how people make judgments about morality,” said study author Justin F. Landy, an assistant professor of psychology and neuroscience at Nova Southeastern University. “Within that field, there is a lot of debate about what, if anything, the emotion of disgust has to do with moral judgments; some of my own work has shown that it probably has very little to do with judgments of people’s actions, but other researchers have suggested that it might be involved in judgments of the people themselves – their moral character.”

“So, questions like this have been bouncing around in my head for a while. This particular project began when I spent a year as a visiting faculty member at Franklin & Marshall College. My friends and colleagues Josh Rottman, Carlota Batres, and Kristi Leimgruber and I were talking about the role of disgust in evaluations of people, and it occurred to us that no one had really looked at whether other people can make us feel disgusted, in a physical, bodily sense, just by being members of some outgroup. So, that’s what we wanted to test.”

To examine the relationship between disgust and partisanship, the researchers conducted three studies with 915 participants in total. Study 1 was conducted in November 2018, shortly after the 2018 midterm elections. Study 2 was conducted in July 2019. Study 3 was conducted in fall 2020, prior to the presidential election.

In all three studies, the participants viewed and rated a series of photographs of human faces with neutral expressions, which were accompanied by information about each person’s political preferences. In Studies 1 and 2, the faces were paired with personal information. In Study 3, the people were shown wearing a shirt that expressed support for one political party (e.g., “Proud Democrat” or “Proud Republican”).

The researchers used a wide variety of measures of disgust. Study 1 asked participants how “gross” each person was on a 9-point scale, ranging from not at all to extremely. Studies 2 and 3 asked how much each person made them “feel disgusted,” “feel grossed out,” and “feel nauseated, gag, and lose your appetite.” Study 3 also recorded the participants’ facial expressions and used Noldus FaceReader software to categorize their emotional reactions.

“We mostly relied on self-report measures of emotion, which can be problematic. However, we were very careful to use self-reports that very concretely represent the experience of physical disgust, and are not likely to accidentally measure moralistic disgust or other kinds of emotions,” Landy said.

The participants were also asked to make other judgments about the people in the photographs (such as their attractiveness, intelligence, trustworthiness, and morality) and indicate how angry the photographs made them. “By allowing participants to rate outgroup members as immoral, unintelligent, and so on, we hoped to reduce theoretically uninteresting use of the grossness scale to express general negativity,” the researchers explained.

Across all three studies, Landy and his colleagues found that Democrats and Republicans reported feeling more physically disgusted after seeing a supporter of the opposite party compared to a supporter of their own party.

“The emotions we feel towards people we disagree with politically are quite nuanced and complex,” Landy told PsyPost. “We specifically measured anger and disgust, and found that people strongly feel both of these emotions. So, our attitudes toward political outgroups go beyond just disagreement or even dislike; they’re characterized by these really visceral, intense emotions, and that might be one reason why we so rarely engage with people we disagree with, except maybe at Thanksgiving dinner.”

But the effect was smaller when “grossed out” or “feel nauseated” was used compared to when “disgusted” was used. Viewing a political opponent was also unrelated to facial expressions of disgust. These findings highlight that “the kind of measure you use matters, and the way you design your study matters, in ways that aren’t always totally obvious,” Landy explained.

“As for what’s next, one open question is how far we can generalize these findings,” the researcher continued. “Do we feel disgusted by all outgroups, or is this unique to people whose politics we disagree with? Or is the answer somewhere in the middle – some types of outgroups elicit disgust but others don’t? At this point, we don’t really know. What we can say with confidence is that members of the ‘other’ political party clearly make us feel disgusted, in a very concrete, very physical sense. And that is something we didn’t know before.”

The study, “Disgusting Democrats and Repulsive Republicans: Members of Political Outgroups Are Considered Physically Gross“, was authored by Justin F. Landy, Joshua Rottman, Carlota Batres, and Kristin L. Leimgruber.

ShareTweetSendScanShareSharePinSend

Thanks for reading! Click here to support PsyPost by becoming a paid subscriber. In an age where information is abundant but quality knowledge is scarce, PsyPost ensures that you stay updated on the most recent and relevant discoveries made in psychology and neuroscience.

STAY CONNECTED

TRENDING

New neuroscience research upends traditional theories of early language learning in babies

A breakthrough in Alzheimer’s treatment? Promising results from new brain stimulation study

Preschoolers categorize people according to body shape rather than race

Scientists revisit Solomon Asch’s classic conformity experiments — and are stunned by the results

New study reveals promising effects of psilocybin in treating severe depression in bipolar II disorder patients

Men are drawn to borderline personality traits in physically attractive women, study finds

RECENT

New study reveals promising effects of psilocybin in treating severe depression in bipolar II disorder patients

A video game might be effective in reducing fear of needles in children

Scientists revisit Solomon Asch’s classic conformity experiments — and are stunned by the results

A breakthrough in Alzheimer’s treatment? Promising results from new brain stimulation study

New study sheds light on the psychological complexities of adult webcam viewers

Preschoolers categorize people according to body shape rather than race

Groundbreaking study pinpoints Trump’s role in surge of negativity in U.S. political discourse

Instability in sleep patterns linked to cognitive decline in older adults

  • Cognitive Science
  • COVID-19
  • Mental Health
  • Social Psychology
  • Drug Research
  • Conspiracy Theories
  • Meditation
  • Psychology of Religion
  • Aviation Psychology and Human Factors
  • Relationships and Sexual Health
  • Evolutionary Psychology
  • Neuroimaging
  • Psychedelic Drugs
  • Dark Triad
  • Political Psychology
  • Contact us
  • Disclaimer
  • Privacy policy
  • Terms and Conditions
Subscribe
  • My Account
  • Cognitive Science Research
  • Mental Health Research
  • Social Psychology Research
  • Drug Research
  • Relationship Research
  • About PsyPost
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In

Add New Playlist

Manage your privacy
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Statistics

Marketing

Features
Always active

Always active
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
Manage options
{title} {title} {title}
Manage your privacy

To provide the best experiences, we and our partners use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us and our partners to process personal data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site and show (non-) personalized ads. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.

Click below to consent to the above or make granular choices. Your choices will be applied to this site only. You can change your settings at any time, including withdrawing your consent, by using the toggles on the Cookie Policy, or by clicking on the manage consent button at the bottom of the screen.

Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Statistics

Marketing

Features
Always active

Always active
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
Manage options
{title} {title} {title}