Candidate evaluations across the aisle: Cross-cultural and experimental evidence that out-partisans value candidate warmth more than in-partisans

Partisans view their own candidates through rose-colored glasses and see competing candidates much more negatively. However, recent advances in political behavior reveal that such directional motivated reasoning is not simply about love and hate but also about more nuanced shifts in preferences. Combining two insights from the psychological sciences—coalitional reasoning and a general dislike of self-interested leaders—we form the novel prediction that voters pay more attention to out-party than to in-party candidates’ warmth. Across three studies, we show firm evidence for this prediction relying on a novel dataset encompassing data from twenty-seven elections from seven countries (Australia, Denmark, Germany, Norway, Sweden, the UK and the US) and a re-analysis of existing experimental data (Total N=140K). Our paper reveals sophisticated psychological mechanisms regulating the importance of candidate warmth and implies that candidates seeking to reduce the partisan gap should establish a warm image.