Bridging the Gap: Testing Auditory Vignettes as a Means to Reduce Polarization in American Politics

ABSTRACT

Political polarization, or the movement of political attitudes away from the center and towards ideological extremes, is rapidly increasing in the United States. This separation between partisans has had significant negative consequences for the country, including congressional impasses, political violence, and a lack of co-partisan dialogue. This research focused on the effectiveness of auditory vignettes in eliciting emotions in a political context and reducing affective polarization, a specific type of political polarization in which people harbor negative feelings towards those of the opposing political party. This was achieved by asking 105 participants to complete a survey in which they were presented with an auditory vignette designed to evoke co-partisan emotions and subsequently asked questions regarding their emotions and feelings of political polarization. It was found that these vignettes are mostly effective in bringing out the emotions anger, anxiety, and kama muta, but are limited in their ability to reduce affective polarization. These results show that alternative strategies are necessary to create a society with lessened disdain for one another, but that tested emotions could be used to inform strategies of future political campaigns. Future studies could investigate the elicitation of other emotions in a political context, as well as test a nationwide sample for more applicable results.

INTRODUCTION.

Two political groups, or parties, dominate the political field across all levels of U.S. government. These two groups, the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, exist on a spectrum of political opinions that ranges, respectively, from “liberal” or “progressive” on one end and “conservative” or “traditional” on the other [1]. While this two-party system relies on civil disagreement over policy, debate in the United States has increasingly been replaced by inflexible stances and animosity towards people of opposing political views [2]. This ideological rigidity and dislike of partisans is commonly referred to as “political polarization.” According to Pew Research Center, 72% of Republicans and 63% of Democrats regard members of the opposing party as more immoral than other Americans [3]. Furthermore, 80% of U.S. adults believe Americans are greatly divided on the most important values, while only 18% believe the country is united and in agreement [4]. This separation in ideals has led to numerous issues in the United States, such as congressional impasses, political violence, and a lack of co-partisan dialogue [5]. Thus, this study sought to test the effectiveness of a specific intervention, an auditory vignette, in reducing levels of polarization in American politics.

Typically, political polarization is measured by assessing one of two subtypes of polarization: affective and ideological. Affective polarization relates to the difference in feelings regarding political groups, while ideological polarization relates to the difference of opinions on social issues [6][7]. Historically, studies have focused on measuring ideological polarization in Congress, though more recent literature has been concentrated on studying affective polarization [8]. The causes of affective polarization can be categorized into two groups: internal and external. Common internal, or individual level, causes include identifying partisanship as a social identity, stereotyping those from an out-group, or those with opposing political beliefs, and using pre-determined conclusions to uphold partisan stances [8]. Conversely, some primary external causes include social sorting, the influence of political elites, and political institutions. However, the leading cause of all affective polarization is the changing media environment [8].

In recent years, much work has been conducted on the effect of the media environment as a cause of affective polarization. A leading theory is the echo chamber hypothesis, which asserts that individuals are increasingly surrounded by political information that already aligns with their beliefs. Evidence suggests that internet usage has contributed significantly to the rise in affective polarization due to selective news exposure, homogenous online social systems, and online algorithms filtering content [8].

The heightened importance of emotions in the political sphere can be seen in the increase in political advertisements designed to focus on emotion as opposed to logic. While candidates across the political spectrum use emotional campaigning to sway voters to their side, emotions such as anger, anxiety [9] and kama muta [10] have been shown to potentially bridge the political divide when presented in a shared context.

As defined by the American Psychological Association [11], anger is “an emotion characterized by tension and hostility arising from frustration…or perceived injustice.” Typically, anger manifests itself in one of two ways: actions intended to remove the object of anger or actions that express the emotion. According to Weeks [9], the emotion anxiety is “an aversive and motivational state that occurs in response to threatening stimuli in one’s environment.” Typically, the emotion is associated with feelings of uncertainty and a lack of personal control over a situation, which leads individuals to produce strategies to reduce these feelings [13]. The term kama muta originates from a Sanskrit word for “moved by love” and has been difficult to theorize correctly in research because its English term is used to describe a broad range of situations. In recent years, kama muta theory has been conceptualized to define the emotion, with Grüning et. al. [12] describing it as “a positive social-relational emotion that is felt when close communal relations intensify and motivates to engage in strengthening of communal relation.” In most instances, the feeling of kama muta corresponds with the feeling of “being moved.”

To measure these emotions, different components are used. The first component, sensation, measures the physical reactions that accompany the emotion being elicited. For anger, these reactions include muscle tenseness, heat in the face and neck, and an increase in heart rate [11]; for anxiety, trembling and rapid breathing [9]; and for kama muta, moist eyes, chills, and a warm feeling in the center of the chest [10]. A second component, appraisal, evaluates an individual’s assessment of situations in which an emotion could be evoked. One experiencing anger should assess their situation as causing injury to themselves or another; one experiencing anxiety should assess their situation as uncertain and beyond their control; and one experiencing kama muta should assess their situation as strengthening a communal sharing relationship. A third component, feeling, measures the correctness of labels used to verbalize emotions. For anger, these labels include “annoying” and “riled me up”; for anxiety, “worry-inducing”, “nervous”, and “restless”; and for kama muta “moved”, “touched”, and “heart-warming.” Finally, the component valence asserts the positivity or negativity of certain emotions. Anger and anxiety are considered negative emotions and kama muta a positive emotion, so valence assesses the validity of this labeling. For the emotion kama muta, a fifth component, called motivation is used to assess the claim that kama muta prompts the strengthening of communal sharing relationships [10]

Accompanying this rapid increase in the importance of emotions in politics and studying affective polarization has been a rise in research regarding it. Novel findings detailing the impact of affective polarization on health show that divisiveness in American politics poses a substantial risk to the sound condition of individuals and the collective group [14]. Studies investigating techniques to reduce affective polarization have also grown in prominence in recent times. One study investigated the use of the emotion kama muta on increasing warmth, social closeness, and trust among political partisans [10]. The study utilized moving videos to unite political opponents through including them in a common American identity. It was found that the usage of the shared emotion kama muta and the theme of a common identity had a main effect on increasing closeness between partisans and reducing affective polarization. This result indicates that the emotion kama muta is important to the process of reducing affective polarization and promoting out-group relations.

However, there is a lack of knowledge on the usage of the emotions anger, anxiety, and kama muta in reducing affective polarization when evoked by a stimulus such as an auditory vignette. With millions of Americans receiving news from auditory stimuli such as radio broadcasts and podcasts, understanding the relationship between auditory vignettes and a reduction of affective polarization is crucial in decreasing partisan antipathy and improving out-group relations.  We hypothesized that if participants are exposed to auditory vignettes designed to elicit emotion, then feelings of anger, anxiety, and kama muta will be evoked. We also hypothesized that if participants listen to auditory vignettes that evoke the shared emotions of anger, anxiety, or kama muta, then affective polarization between partisans will decrease, with feelings of partisan antipathy lessening and out-group relations improving.

MATERIALS AND METHODS.

Participants.

A total of 121 participants participated in this study. Participants were excluded from the study at various stages if they declined to advance past the informed consent process, did not identify closely with either the Democratic or Republican Party, lived outside the United States, or had technical issues listening to the vignettes. After these exclusions, the final sample included 105 participants.

Survey Consent and Distribution.

The survey was created on Microsoft Forms in June 2025 and revised throughout the following four months. Following creation of the survey, Institutional Review Board (IRB) was sought and obtained. The survey included an introduction section in which participants were informed of general details of the study and asked consent questions to confirm that they were aware the survey was voluntary, anonymous, and could be stopped at any time. Participants were required to be over the age of 18 and residents of the United States to participate in the study. The survey was distributed on Instagram and Facebook, as well as emailed to coworkers of the mentor.

Demographics and Political Party Affiliation.

After participants were presented with general information about the study and completed the informed consent process, they were asked to indicate their gender, age, country, state, and neighborhood of residence, highest level of education, and ethnicity. Next, to determine a participant’s political leanings, they were asked which political party they more closely aligned with. Within the final sample, 80 participants aligned more with the Democratic Party (76.2%) and 25 more with the Republican Party (23.8%). Demographic information is summarized in Table S1.

Measuring Emotion Elicitation Effect.

Participants were randomly assigned to one of three emotional vignettes or to the control group. Details of vignette design can be found in the SI document. After listening to a vignette, participants reported either how upsetting, how stressful, or how moving the vignette had been to them, based off whether they had been presented with anger, anxiety, or kama muta content. The elicitation of the emotions anger and anxiety was evaluated by posing questions about participants’ sensation, appraisal, negative valence, and feeling. Similarly, to evaluate the emotion kama muta, questions were posed that evaluated participants’ sensation, appraisal, and feeling. However, for the emotion kama muta, further questions assessed participants’ positive valence and motivation, key components in fully measuring the evocation of this emotion.

Measuring Affective Polarization.

Following this, affective polarization, or the tendency of individuals aligning with Democrats or Republicans to view opposing partisans negatively and co-partisans positively, was measured. Different survey instruments were utilized to achieve this, as recommended by Druckman et al. [8]. First, participants were presented with a set of statements, known as common ground measures, that evaluate mutual interest in agreement between parties. After, participants were presented with questions known as social-distance measures, gauging the degree of intimacy individuals felt secure having with those from an opposing political party. A final set of questions gauged participant’s trust of the out-party’s voters to do what is right for the country. For each set of questions, a score on the lower end of the range indicated higher levels of affective polarization, and a score on the higher end of the range indicated lower levels of affective polarization. The specific measures in this section were chosen because when combined, they assess general attitudes about partisans and behavioral outcomes of relationships with partisans, both essential components in successfully measuring affective polarization.

Design.

The design differed within participants, depending on which vignette the participant viewed (anger, anxiety, kama muta). Participants were assigned to one of the three emotional vignettes or to the control group using randomization tools inside of Microsoft Forms. Participants assigned to an emotional vignette were presented with questions measuring the emotion elicitation, then questions measuring affective polarization. If a participant was assigned to the control group, they were directly presented with questions measuring affective polarization without exposure to a vignette.

Data Analysis.

Following the completion of the survey period, the data was collected and analyzed using Microsoft Excel through a series of tests. First, questions measuring different components of each emotion were aggregated into a single scale by averaging the scores from the questions that comprised each component together. This same process was also done for the measures of affective polarization, synthesizing multiple questions into three primary scales: common ground, social distance, and out-group trust. Following this, a one-way ANOVA test was run to test the statistical significance of each measure of affective polarization for each emotional vignette, as well as to test the significance between emotions for each component. After, a Tukey HSD Test was run to determine the difference between groups.

RESULTS.

Hypothesis 1 Results.

For each emotion, different components of the emotion were measured through a series of questions. For the emotions of anger and anxiety, the components of valence, appraisal, feeling, and sensation were measured. Identical components were used to measure kama muta, with the addition of another component, motivation. All components of each emotion were measured on a 7-point Likert scale, with the degree of elicitation of the emotion increasing as the Likert score increases and a score of over 4 (“neutral”) indicating significant emotion elicitation. The results for each emotion can be seen in Figure 1. Statistical analysis results for Sensation, Appraisal, Valence, and Feeling components are shown in Table 1.

Table 1. Comparing the effectiveness of each vignette in producing emotion response relative to other vignettes using an ANOVA test.
Sensation
	Anger	Anxiety	Kama Muta
Anger	–	Nonsignificant	Nonsignificant
Anxiety	–	–	Nonsignificant
Appraisal
	Anger	Anxiety	Kama Muta
Anger	–	P < .05	Nonsignificant
Anxiety	–	–	Nonsignificant
Valence
	Anger	Anxiety	Kama Muta
Anger	–	Nonsignificant	P < .01
Anxiety	–	–	P < .05
Feeling
	Anger	Anxiety	Kama Muta
Anger	–	P < .01	P < .01
Anxiety	–	–	Nonsignificant

Hypothesis 2 Results.

To measure affective polarization, common ground, social distance, and out-group trust measures were used. The scores for each component of affective polarization are shown in Figure 2 in comparison to the scores from the control group. Statistical analysis results for the Common Ground, Social Distance, and Out-Group Trust measures of affective polarization are shown in Table 2.

 

Table 2. Statistical test on Common Ground, Social Distance, and Out-Group Trust measures of affective polarization.
Common Ground
	Anger	Anxiety	Kama Muta
Control	P < .01	P < .01	P < 0.1
Social Distance
	Anger	Anxiety	Kama Muta
Control	Nonsignificant	P < .05	Nonsignificant
Out-Group Trust
	Anger	Anxiety	Kama Muta
Control	Nonsignificant	Nonsignificant	Nonsignificant

DISCUSSION.

 

Hypothesis 1 Discussion.

For each component of each emotion, an average Likert score of 4 or more, or indication that participants felt greater emotion than a “neutral” state, qualified as emotion elicitation for that specific component. For the emotions anger, anxiety, and kama muta, the emotional components of appraisal, valence, and feeling each had an average Likert score of 4 or more, indicating that these specific components were evoked by the vignettes. However, for each emotion, the component of sensation did not have an average Likert score of 4 or more, indicating that this component was not brought out by the vignettes. A similar pattern of non-elicitation was present in the kama muta specific component of motivation, which also had an average Likert score of below 4. These results indicate that participants presented with vignettes generally assessed them as emotion-inducing, identified the positivity or negativity of the content presented in them, and experienced the feeling intended to be evoked by them, but did not experience the physical reactions that accompany the emotions.

In addition to this, one-way ANOVA tests were run to determine the difference in emotion elicitation for each component. For the component appraisal, there was a significant difference (p < .05) between the emotions of anger and anxiety, indicating that anger vignettes were more effective in bringing out this component than anxiety vignettes. Furthermore, for the component valence, there was a significant difference between the emotions of kama muta and anger (p < .01) and kama muta and anxiety (p < .05), indicating that kama muta vignettes were more effective in evoking this component than anxiety vignettes. Finally, for the component feeling, there was a significant difference between the emotions of anxiety and anger (p < .01) and kama muta and anger (p <.01), indicating that both anxiety and kama muta vignettes were more effective in eliciting this component than anger vignettes.

Hypothesis 2 Discussion.

Each emotion had varying levels of effectiveness in reducing affective polarization in participants. For the Common Ground measure, the one-way ANOVA test showed a significant difference (p < .01) between the results of each emotion and the results of the control group, indicating that for this measure, the vignettes reduced affective polarization. However, this was not the case for the other two measures. For the Social Distance measure, there was no significance between the vignette and control groups for the emotions anger and kama muta, showing that these emotions did not reduce affective polarization by this measure. There was, however, a significant difference (p < .05) between the results for the emotion anxiety and the results of the control group for this measure. Due to the average Likert score for the anxiety vignette group being lower than that of the control group, it is indicated that the anxiety vignettes increased affective polarization for the Social Distance measure. For the final measure of affective polarization, Out-Group Trust, there was no significance between any of the vignette groups and the control group, showing that there was no reduction of this measure of polarization by the vignettes.

CONCLUSION.

The objectives of this study were to determine if the emotions anger, anxiety, and kama muta could be elicited by an auditory vignette in a political context, and if the emotions used by the vignettes could reduce affective political polarization between those of differing political beliefs. The objectives were achieved by asking 105 participants to complete a survey, in which they were presented with one of three vignettes and asked to answer questions regarding their feelings after listening to the vignette and their opinions of those from the opposing political party. It was found that the components of appraisal, valence, and feeling of the emotions anger, anxiety, and kama muta were evoked by the auditory vignettes, while the component of sensation was not. This indicates that most components of the emotions of anger, anxiety, and kama muta can be brought out by an auditory vignette within the electorate. It was also found that the anger, anxiety, and kama muta vignettes were effective in reducing affective polarization when judged by the Common Ground measure, but not when judged by the Social Distance or Out-Group Polarization measures. These results suggest that auditory stimuli such as the ones presented in this survey can mostly evoke emotion among the voting public but can only be used in limited ways to reduce affective polarization. In conclusion, there is still much work to do on finding interventions to reduce political polarization, but the emotions anger, anxiety, and kama muta, shown to be elicited in a political context, could be the key to a society with lessened disdain for one another and a greater common interest in maintaining the democratic values that uphold the United States.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.

Thank you to Dr. Gregory Smith, Dr. Nathaniel Freymeyer, and the entire Interdisciplinary Science and Research Program for support on my project.

SUPPORTING INFORMATION.

Additional information on vignette material and participant demographics.

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Posted by buchanle on Thursday, May 14, 2026 in May 2026.

Tags: Anger, Anxiety, Kama Muta, Political Polarization