{"id":2389,"date":"2019-02-08T08:00:05","date_gmt":"2019-02-08T14:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/?p=2389"},"modified":"2019-02-05T16:53:13","modified_gmt":"2019-02-05T22:53:13","slug":"the-political-polarization-phenomenon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/2019\/02\/08\/the-political-polarization-phenomenon\/","title":{"rendered":"The Political Polarization Phenomenon"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Photo of two microphones by H\u00e5kan Dahlstr\u00f6m, Flickr CC<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This post was created in collaboration with the <\/i>Minnesota Journalism Center<\/i><\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u201cPolitical polarization\u201d refers to sharpening contrasts between political parties, groups, and individuals. The 2016 U.S. presidential election catalyzed a wave of research about political polarization, filter bubbles, and echo chambers. With this rise in polarization research, i<\/span>t is important to distinguish between ideological polarization, people having more extreme political views; affective polarization, people having negative sentiment toward other political parties; and party alignment, people affixing strong party labels to themselves. Being clear about the differences between these forms of polarization adds a layer of nuance to research on whether polarization is rising and what drives such changes. <\/span><\/p>\n

The three types of polarization don\u2019t always go hand-in-hand. For example, social science research shows rises in affective polarization and party alignment, but the same isn\u2019t necessarily true for ideological polarization.<\/h5>\n