Emotions

In this study, I propose a new approach to studying emotions in politics. I assume that emotions about politics is communicated social information, which functions similarly to political judgements. Individuals' political attitudes are largely guided by ideology and what is deemed normative in their party peer networks (Bartels, 2000; Hetherington, 2001). For instance, democrats will often make judgments that are more associated with the democratic values, because this is how they feel and this is how they show their belonging to the democratic flank. In a similar logic, when asked about emotions, citizens will not feel how to feel about a political event, rather they will run in memory a set of plausible associations (Lodge and Taber, 2005) and choose the one that most accurately accommodates their ideological position.