Pundits, pollsters, and academics have long expressed concerns about America fragmenting into hostile subgroups. While policy preferences have long been an important perceived source of this division, recent social science research has emphasized the role of group identity and affect in exacerbating political polarization. Since Americans commonly associate party membership with other social identities (such as racial minorities with the Democratic party or white Evangelicals with the Republican party), partisan antipathy may inform attitudes towards other social groups.

My research with Ramina Sotoudeh draws on national survey data and computational methods to investigate the networked structure of Americans’ attitudes towards a wide range of social groups.


Publications

Brensinger, Jordan and Ramina Sotoudeh. 2022. “Party, Race, and Neutrality: Investigating the Interdependence of Attitudes Toward Social Groups.” American Sociological Review 87(6): 1049-1093. Accepted versionSupplement. Replication materials.