TY - JOUR
T1 - Measuring Emotional Responses to Negative Commercials
T2 - A Comparison of Two Methods
AU - Fridkin, Kim
AU - Kenney, Patrick J.
AU - Cooper, Bartia
AU - Deutsch, Ryan
AU - Gutierrez, Manuel
AU - Williams, Alexandra
PY - 2020
Y1 - 2020
N2 - We compare two alternative measures for assessing people’s emotional reactions to political stimuli: the traditional self-report measure and facial expression analysis. We recruited participants to take part in a study examining reactions to a set of negative political commercials aired during the 2018 elections. We compare people’s self-reporting of their emotional reactions to negative political advertisements with their expressed emotion, according to the facial expression analysis. We find the discriminant validity of the facial expression analysis is higher than the self-report measure. Second, the self-report and facial expression measures of emotion have little convergent validity: we fail to find a consistent and strong positive correlation between the self-report and facial software measures of the same emotion and the same political advertisement. Third, the facial software measure has better predictive validity than the self-report measure, generating better predictions for the three dependent variables examined: changes in political interest, changes in people’s confidence in elected officials, and people’s assessment of the tone of the senate campaign.
AB - We compare two alternative measures for assessing people’s emotional reactions to political stimuli: the traditional self-report measure and facial expression analysis. We recruited participants to take part in a study examining reactions to a set of negative political commercials aired during the 2018 elections. We compare people’s self-reporting of their emotional reactions to negative political advertisements with their expressed emotion, according to the facial expression analysis. We find the discriminant validity of the facial expression analysis is higher than the self-report measure. Second, the self-report and facial expression measures of emotion have little convergent validity: we fail to find a consistent and strong positive correlation between the self-report and facial software measures of the same emotion and the same political advertisement. Third, the facial software measure has better predictive validity than the self-report measure, generating better predictions for the three dependent variables examined: changes in political interest, changes in people’s confidence in elected officials, and people’s assessment of the tone of the senate campaign.
KW - emotions
KW - facial expression analysis
KW - negative advertisements
KW - self-report
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85083255706&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85083255706&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/1065912920912840
DO - 10.1177/1065912920912840
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85083255706
JO - Political Research Quarterly
JF - Political Research Quarterly
SN - 1065-9129
ER -