Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T07:14:07.775Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Language Heightens the Political Salience of Ethnic Divisions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 November 2018

Efrén O. Pérez  and
Margit Tavits
Efrén O. Pérez
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science and Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, 4289 Bunche Hall, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA e-mail: [email protected]
Margit Tavits
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Washington University in St. Louis, One Brookings Dr., Campus Box 1063, St. Louis, MO 63130, USA e-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

What makes people take ethnic divisions into account when judging politics? We consider here the possible effect of language. We hypothesize that speaking a minority tongue primes ethnic divisions, leading people to interpret politics more heavily through this prism. In two survey experiments with bilingual adults, we demonstrate that subjects assigned to interview in a minority language are indeed more likely to evaluate politics based on ethnic considerations: they rank ethnic relations as a more important political issue and they are more likely to correctly identify the anti-minority party in their political system. These results suggest that people may think about politics differently depending on the language they use.

Keywords

language and political cognitionethnic divisionsbelief-samplingmental accessibility
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Experimental Political Science , Volume 6 , Issue 2 , Summer 2019 , pp. 131 - 140
Copyright
Copyright © The Experimental Research Section of the American Political Science Association 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

Support for this research was provided by the Weidenbaum Center on the Economy, Government, and Public Policy, and Center for New Institutional Social Science. The data, code, and any additional materials required to replicate all analyses in this article are available at the Journal of Experimental Political Science Dataverse within the Harvard Dataverse Network, at doi:10.7910/DVN/0XSLQX. We thank Kristin Michelitch and Amanda Lea Robinson for helpful comments on previous drafts of this paper. Neither author declares any conflicts of interest.

References

REFERENCES

Adida, Claire L., Ferree, Karen E., Posner, Daniel N., and Robinson, Amanda Lea. 2016a. “Who's Asking? Interviewer Coethnicity Effects in African Survey Data.” Comparative Political Studies 49 (12): 1630–60.Google Scholar
Adida, Claire, Combes, Nathan, Lo, Adeline, and Vernik, Alex. 2016b. “The Spousal Bump: Do Cross-Ethnic Marriages Increase Political Support in Multiethnic Democracies?.” Comparative Political Studies 49 (5): 635–61.Google Scholar
Adida, Claire, Gottlieb, Jessica, Kramon, Eric, and McClendon, Gwyneth. 2017. “Reducing or Reinforcing In-Group Preferences? An Experiment on Information and Ethnic Voting.” Quarterly Journal of Political Science 12: 437–77.Google Scholar
Birnir, Johanna Kristin. 2007. “Divergence in Diversity? The Dissimilar Effects of Cleavages on Electoral Politics in New Democracies.” American Journal of Political Science 51: 602–19.Google Scholar
Boroditsky, Lera. 2001. “Does Language Shape Thought?: Mandarin and English Speakers' Conception of Time.” Cognitive Psychology 43 (1): 1–22.Google Scholar
Boroditsky, Lera. 2003. “Linguistic Relativity.” In Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science, ed. Nadel, L.. London: MacMillan Press.Google Scholar
Boroditsky, Lera. 2011. “Do English and Mandarin Speakers Think About Time Differently?.” Cognition 118 (1): 123–9.Google Scholar
Campbell, Donald T. and Stanley, Julian C.. 1963. Experimental and Quasi-Experimental Designs for Research. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.Google Scholar
Chandra, Kanchan. 2012. Constructivist Theories of Ethnic Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Danziger, Shai and Ward, Robert. 2010. “Language Changes Implicit Associations Between Ethnic Groups and Evaluation in Bilinguals.” Psychological Science 21 (6): 799–800.Google Scholar
Delli Carpini, Michael X. and Keeter, Scott. 1996. What Americans Know about Politics and Why It Matters. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Dunning, Thad and Harrison, Lauren. 2010. “Cross-cutting Cleavages and Ethnic Voting: An Experimental Study of Cousinage in Mali.” American Political Science Review 104: 1–19.Google Scholar
Eifert, Benn, Miguel, Edward, and Posner, Daniel N.. 2010. “Political Competition and Ethnic Identification in Africa.” American Journal of Political Science 54 (2): 494–510.Google Scholar
Fausey, Caitilin M. and Boroditsky, Lera. 2011. “Who Dunnit? Cross-Linguistic Differences in Eye-Witness Memory.” Psychonomic Bulletin and Review 18: 150–7.Google Scholar
Fausey, Caitlin M., Long, Bria L., Inamori, Aya, and Boroditsky, Lera. 2010. “Constructing Agency: The Role of Language.” Frontiers in Psychology 1: 162.Google Scholar
Kallas, Kristina, Vetik, Raivo, Kruusvall, Jüri, Saar, Ellu, Helemäe, Jelena, Kirss, Laura, Leppik, Cenely, Seppel, Külliki, Kivistik, Kats, and Ubakivi-Hadachi, Pille. 2015. Eesti ühiskonna lõimumismonitooring. Tallinn: Kultuuriministeerium.Google Scholar
Kinder, Donald R. and Kam, Cindy D.. 2009. Us Against Them: Ethnocentric Foundations of American Opinion. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Laitin, David D. 1977. Politics, Language, and Thought. Chicago: Chicago University Press.Google Scholar
Laitin, David D. 1998. Identity in Formation: The Russian-speaking Populations in the Near Abroad. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Lauristin, Marju, Kaal, Esta, Kirss, Laura, Kriger, Tanja, Masso, Anu, Nurmela, Kristi, Seppel, Külliki, Tammaru, Tiit, Uus, Maiu, Vihalemm, Peeter, Vihalemm, Triin, and Jufereva, Maria. 2011. Eesti ühiskonna integratisooni monitooring 2011. Tallinn: Kultuuriministeerium.Google Scholar
Lee, Taeku and Pérez, Efrén O.. 2014. “The Persistent Connection Between Language-of-Interview and Latino Political Opinion.” Political Behavior 36 (2): 401–25.Google Scholar
Lieberman, Evan S. and McClendon, Gwyneth H.. 2013. “The Ethnicity-Policy Preference Link in Sub-Saharn Africa.” Comparative Political Studies 46 (5): 574–602.Google Scholar
Lodge, Milton and Taber, Charles S.. 2013. The Rationalizing Voter. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Marian, Viorica and Kaushanskaya, Margarita. 2007. “Language context guides memory content.” Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 14 (5): 925–33.Google Scholar
Marian, Viorica and Neisser, Ulric. 2000. “Language-Dependent Recall of Autobiographical Memories.” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 129 (3): 361–8.Google Scholar
McCauley, John F. 2014. “The Political Mobilization of Ethnic and Religious Identities in Africa.” American Political Science Review 108 (4): 801–16.Google Scholar
Michelitch, Kristin L. 2015. “Does Electoral Competition Exacerbate Interethnic or Interpartisan Economic Discrimination? Evidence from a Field Experiment in Market Price Bargaining.” American Political Science Review 109 (1): 43–61.Google Scholar
Pérez, Efrén O. 2015. “The Language-Opinion Connection.” In The Oxford Handbook of Polling and Polling Methods, eds., Michael Alvarez, R. and Atkeson, Lonna. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pérez, Efrén O. 2016. “Rolling off the Tongue into the Top-of-the-Head: Explaining Language Effects on Public Opinion.” Political Behavior 38 (3): 603–34.Google Scholar
Pérez, Efrén O. and Tavits, Margit. 2018. “Replication Data for: Language Heightens the Political Salience of Ethnic Divisions.” Harvard Dataverse, V1. doi:10.7910/DVN/0XSLQX.Google Scholar
Phillips, Webb and Boroditsky, Lera. 2003. “Can Quirks of Grammar Affect the Way You Think? Grammatical Gender and Object Concepts.” Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society 25 (25): 928–33.Google Scholar
Posner, Daniel N. 2005. Institutions and Ethnic Politics in Africa. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Püvi, Maarja. 1999. Venelaste Integratsioon Eesti ühiskonda. Tartu: University of Tartu.Google Scholar
Raun, Toivo. 2002. Estonia and the Estonians. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press.Google Scholar
Rovny, Jan. 2014. “Communism, Federalism and Ethnic Minorities: Explaining Party Competition Patterns in Eastern Europe.” World Politics 66 (4): 669–708.Google Scholar
Slobin, Dan. 1996. “From “Thought and Language” to “Thinking for Speaking”.” In Rethinking Linguistic Relativity, eds. Gumperz, John J. and Levinson, Stephen C.. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Tourangeau, Roger, Rips, Lance J., and Rasinski, Kenneth. 2000. The Psychology of Survey Response. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Zaller, John R. 1992. The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: Link

Pérez and Tavits Dataset

Dataset

https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/0XSLQX
Link
Supplementary material: File

Pérez and Tavits supplementary material

Pérez and Tavits supplementary material 1

Download Pérez and Tavits supplementary material(File)
File 68.5 KB