Fragmentation and Social Polarization: The Character of Political Attitude Extremism in America.

Abstract

In spite of growing concerns about political extremism, no adequate measure exists to empirically test the character of political attitudes. The purpose of this study was to develop a measurement of political attitude extremism and, using this measure, assess the communication phenomena that contribute to political extremism. To this end, two surveys were distributed to a total of 504 participants (316 for Study 1 and 188 for Study 2). Study 1 assessed the properties of political attitude extremism. The second study used the measure developed in Study 1 to determine the extent to which media habits, homogeneity of social networks, partisan polarization, political information efficacy, political talk, and moral certainty contribute to political attitude extremism. Study 1 found that liberal attitude extremism and conservative attitude extremism are not opposite ends of the same spectrum but rather are distinct variables with unique measurement properties. Furthermore, conservative attitude extremism must be subdivided into fiscal conservative extremism and social conservative extremism, while liberalism did not require such a division. Study 2 found that these three extremism variables (liberal attitude extremism, social conservative attitude extremism, fiscal conservative attitude extremism) behave differently relative to the communication phenomenon examined. Specifically, ideological media use and political talk significantly predicted liberal attitude extremism, homogeneity of social network and partisan polarization significantly predicted social conservative attitude extremism, and partisan polarization and political information efficacy significantly predicted fiscal conservative attitude extremism. These findings demonstrate that scholarship must consider attitude extremism as multifaceted and must adjust theory accordingly. The new measurement tools provided by this study represent a significant advancement in the empirical study of political extremism.