The Affect Effect of Political Satire: Sarcastic Humor, Negative Emotions, and Political Participation

Building on the Orientation-Stimulus-Orientation-Response (O-S-O-R) framework, the current study proposes a mediation model wherein negative emotions serve as a second O. An online experiment using a representative sample demonstrated that consuming sarcastic political humor can indirectly increase the likelihood of political participation by eliciting negative emotions toward a government policy. In addition, we introduced education as a first O, illustrating that the indirect mobilizing effect of the viewing of sarcastic humor through negative emotions is stronger for political sophisticates. The proposed model suggests avenues for exploring the role of emerging media genres that are presumably less enlightening yet are more emotionally provocative.

[1]  D. Young.  The Privileged Role of the Late-Night Joke: Exploring Humor's Role in Disrupting Argument Scrutiny , 2008 .

[2]  Scott L. Althaus.  What's Good and Bad in Political Communication Research? Normative Standards for Evaluating Media and Citizen Performance , 2011 .

[3]  J. Krosnick.  EXPERTISE AND POLITICAL PSYCHOLOGY , 1990 .

[4]  J. Goodwin,et al.  Introduction: Why Emotions Matter , 2001 .

[5]  D. Griffin,et al.  Satire: A Critical Reintroduction , 1994 .

[6]  Julia R. Fox,et al.  No Joke: A Comparison of Substance in The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and Broadcast Network Television Coverage of the 2004 Presidential Election Campaign , 2007 .

[7]  C. E. Schutz.  Political Humor: From Aristophanes to Sam Ervin , 1976 .

[8]  Lindsay H. Hoffman,et al.  The Effect of Television Viewing on Adolescents' Civic Participation: Political Efficacy as a Mediating Mechanism , 2009 .

[9]  S. Rosenberg.  The Structure of Political Thinking , 1988 .

[10]  Thomas J. Rudolph,et al.  The Effects of Efficacy and Emotions on Campaign Involvement , 2000, The Journal of Politics.

[11]  E. Lambeth.  With Malice toward All? the Media and Public Confidence in Democratic Institutions , 2000 .

[12]  Robin L. Nabi,et al.  All Joking Aside: A Serious Investigation into the Persuasive Effect of Funny Social Issue Messages , 2007 .

[13]  Jayeon Lee,et al.  Predicting the Consumption of Political TV Satire: Affinity for Political Humor, The Daily Show, and The Colbert Report , 2011 .

[14]  R. Collins.  Stratification, emotional energy, and the transient emotions. , 1990 .

[15]  Xiaoxia Cao,et al.  Political Comedy Shows and Knowledge About Primary Campaigns: The Moderating Effects of Age and Education , 2008 .

[16]  Dietram A. Scheufele,et al.  Community, Communication, and Participation: The Role of Mass Media and Interpersonal Discussion in Local Political Participation , 1999 .

[17]  Dominique Brossard,et al.  Social Structure and Citizenship: Examining the Impacts of Social Setting, Network Heterogeneity, and Informational Variables on Political Participation , 2004 .

[18]  Richard A. Brody,et al.  Reasoning and Choice: Explorations in Political Psychology , 1991 .

[19]  Mardi J. Horowitz,et al.  The Psychology of Fear and Stress, 2nd ed , 1989 .

[20]  Roderick P. Hart,et al.  The Political Sins of Jon Stewart , 2007 .

[21]  R. Olshavsky,et al.  The Dual Role of Emotions in Consumer Satisfaction/Dissatisfaction , 1995 .

[22]  Heather L. LaMarre,et al.  Ability Matters: Testing the Differential Effects of Political News and Late-Night Political Comedy on Cognitive Responses and the Role of Ability in Micro-Level Opinion Formation , 2013 .

[23]  Michael A. Xenos,et al.  Moments of Zen: Effects of The Daily Show on Information Seeking and Political Learning , 2009 .

[24]  Dennis F. Kinsey,et al.  The Reasoning Voter: Communication and Persuasion in Presidential Campaigns , 1993 .

[25]  Jennifer Wolak,et al.  Civic Engagements: Resolute Partisanship or Reflective Deliberation , 2010 .

[26]  Richard S. Lazarus,et al.  The cognition–emotion debate: A bit of history. , 2005 .

[27]  Presidential Debate Viewing and Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9–11: A Study of Affect-as-Transfer and Passionate Reasoning , 2007 .

[28]  Kristopher J Preacher,et al.  Asymptotic and resampling strategies for assessing and comparing indirect effects in multiple mediator models , 2008, Behavior research methods.

[29]  David Ost.  Politics as the Mobilization of Anger , 2004 .

[30]  A. Hayes.  Introduction to Mediation, Moderation, and Conditional Process Analysis: A Regression-Based Approach , 2013 .

[31]  J. Russell.  A circumplex model of affect. , 1980 .

[32]  J. Gray,et al.  The psychology of fear and stress , 1971 .

[33]  A. Lupia.  Shortcuts Versus Encyclopedias: Information and Voting Behavior in California Insurance Reform Elections , 1994, American Political Science Review.

[34]  J. Goodwin,et al.  Why Emotions Matter , 2001 .

[35]  Michael A. Xenos,et al.  Direct and Differential Effects of the Internet on Political and Civic Engagement , 2007 .

[36]  Mira Sotirovic, Jack M. McLeod.  Values, Communication Behavior, and Political Participation , 2001 .

[37]  Henry E. Brady,et al.  Voice and Equality: Civic Voluntarism in American Politics , 1996 .

[38]  Marco Battaglini,et al.  Efficiency, Equity, and Timing of Voting Mechanisms , 2005, American Political Science Review.

[39]  P. Brewer,et al.  Political Comedy Shows and Public Participation in Politics , 2008 .

[40]  Young Mie Kim,et al.  Just Laugh! You Don’t Need to Remember: The Effects of Entertainment Media on Political Information Acquisition and Information Processing in Political Judgment , 2008 .

[41]  A.M.J. Derks.  Post-broadcast democracy: How media choice increases inequality in political involvement and polarizes elections , 2009 .

[42]  J. Lerner,et al.  Fear, anger, and risk. , 2001, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[43]  S. Iyengar,et al.  Going Negative: How Political Advertisements Shrink and Polarize the Electorate , 1995 .

[44]  Hoon Lee,et al.  Communication Mediation Model of Late-Night Comedy: The Mediating Role of Structural Features of Interpersonal Talk Between Comedy Viewing and Political Participation , 2012 .

[45]  R. Lance Holbert,et al.  A Typology for the Study of Entertainment Television and Politics , 2005 .

[46]  Glenn J. Hansen,et al.  Fahrenheit 9-11, Need for Closure and the Priming of Affective Ambivalence: An Assessment of Intra-affective Structures by Party Identification , 2006 .

[47]  A ValentinoNicholas,et al.  Election Night’s Alright for Fighting: The Role of Emotions in Political Participation , 2011 .

[48]  Michael A. Xenos,et al.  Communication and Citizenship: Mapping the Political Effects of Infotainment , 2005 .

[49]  S. Robert Lichter,et al.  The Political Content of Late Night Comedy , 2003 .

[50]  Sabrina Eberhart,et al.  The Handbook Of Communication Science , 2016 .

[51]  Matthew N. Beckmann,et al.  A Spiral of Cynicism for Some: The Contingent Effects of Campaign News Frames on Participation and Confidence in Government , 2001 .

[52]  R. Lance Holbert,et al.  Primacy Effects of The Daily Show and National TV News Viewing: Young Viewers, Political Gratifications, and Internal Political Self-Efficacy , 2007 .

[53]  W. R. Neuman,et al.  Affective Intelligence and Political Judgment , 2000 .

[54]  M. Slater.  Reinforcing Spirals: The Mutual Influence of Media Selectivity and Media Effects and Their Impact on Individual Behavior and Social Identity , 2007 .

[55]  Amy B. Becker.  Political Humor as Democratic Relief? The Effects of Exposure to Comedy and Straight News on Trust and Efficacy , 2011 .

[56]  Jody C. Baumgartner,et al.  The Daily Show Effect , 2006 .

[57]  Sally M. Dunlop,et al.  Can You Feel It? Negative Emotion, Risk, and Narrative in Health Communication , 2008 .

[58]  Lindsay H. Hoffman,et al.  Satire, Punch Lines, and the Nightly News: Untangling Media Effects on Political Participation , 2011 .

[59]  D. Young,et al.  Late-Night Comedy in Election 2000: Its Influence on Candidate Trait Ratings and the Moderating Effects of Political Knowledge and Partisanship , 2004 .

[60]  Matthew P. Taylor.  Entertaining Politics: New Political Television and Civic Culture , 2007 .