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Emotions in Political Attitudes: Long-held Partisanship, Compassionate Anger, and Self-regarding Anxiety in the Korean Public Opinion : 정치태도의 감정적 토대: 한국 대중여론에서 장기적 당파심, 공감적 분노, 개인적 불안감의 정치적 의미

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dc.contributor.advisor박원호-
dc.contributor.author신화용-
dc.date.accessioned2017-07-19T12:05:53Z-
dc.date.available2017-07-19T12:05:53Z-
dc.date.issued2015-08-
dc.identifier.other000000067185-
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10371/134109-
dc.description학위논문 (석사)-- 서울대학교 대학원 : 정치외교학부 정치학전공, 2015. 8. 박원호.-
dc.description.abstractThis study aims to understand the political significance of emotions in political attitudes in the context of South Korea. Against the popular notion of democratic citizenship in which emotions are marginalized while intellect and knowledge are emphasized, this study proposes that emotions can be the central route through which citizens interact with political discourses and contexts to shape their political attitudes. The findings of this study shed light on the political relevance of emotions, which has been overlooked in the public opinion studies of South Korea for a long time.
The results of the survey experiment on fifteen social issues highlight the political significance of emotions with the following implications. First, through the experimental survey with partisanship cues, it is found that party identification, the long-held emotional attachment to political parties, serves as a structural background of political attitudes on which individuals accept or reject elite discourses and accordingly determine their own opinions, rather than randomly or uncritically accepting all types of elite discourse. The mobilizing effect of elite discourse can be either substantial or negligible depending on individual citizens partisanship, the partisan cleavage shaped around the issue, and the issue salience. These findings imply that partisanship might contribute to the democratic process as a solid basis of political attitudes.
Second, on the issues that are applied with compassion cues, it is found that compassionate anger toward social injustice or hardships of others encourages individuals to be more attentive to the given message and to more actively reflect it on their political attitudes. When compassionate anger is triggered, people show higher tendency to accept the alternative viewpoint that is in conflict with their initial preference, which implies the conducive role of emotions in promoting tolerance for different opinions. Furthermore, especially on the issues that are closely related to specific political symbols, compassionate anger strengthens the connection between policy preference and preexisting political predisposition such as ideology, which suggests another way of how emotions come to have political relevance in mass opinion.
Lastly, when self-regarding anxiety is triggered by neighborhood cues, the linkage between personal life and political agenda is strengthened in citizens minds, as it is manifested on their expressed opinions. While it has been claimed in the previous studies that personal interest has minimal impact on political attitudes because citizens perceive political issues as abstract and distant from their own lives, the results of this study indicate that self-regarding anxiety, triggered by the localization of issues, significantly alters individuals opinions in accordance with self-regarding anxiety about their expected personal consequences. These findings imply that citizens form their political attitudes based on the reasonable considerations for personal conditions through self-regarding anxiety.
Despite the substantial difficulty of studying emotions due to their impalpable nature, this study contributes to the political science scholarship of South Korea as an initial attempt to empirically demonstrate the political relevance of a wide range of emotions in diverse social contexts. Rather than being a disruptive or inconsequential component of political attitudes, this study suggests that emotions can encourage citizens to more actively engage in political affairs in the following ways: first, the measured responses to elite discourses based on partisan attachment
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dc.description.abstractsecond, the active consideration of relevant information and the tolerance for differing opinions encouraged by compassionate anger-
dc.description.abstractand lastly, the intimate connection between the political issues and their own lives fostered by self-regarding anxiety. Through these findings, I wish that this study would be a watershed in the public opinion studies of South Korea as the first serious attempt to include emotions as the central research agenda in our pursuit to understand political thoughts and behaviors of the mass public.-
dc.description.tableofcontentsⅠ. Introduction 1
1. Emotions and the Study of Public Opinion 1
2. Research Questions and Outline of Chapters 6
Ⅱ. Theoretical Backgrounds 9
1. Emotions and Democratic Citizenship 9
1.1. Emotions as Undemocratic Trait 9
1.2. Emotions as Democratic Virtue 12
2. Emotions toward Political Parties, Society, and Self 16
2.1. Long-term and Short-term Emotions 16
2.2. Partisan Attachment 21
2.3. Compassionate Anger and Self-regarding Anxiety 23
Ⅲ. Research Methods and Data 27
1. Issue Framing and Political Attitudes 27
2. Experimental Survey Design 29
2.1. Partisanship Experiment: Elite Discourse 32
2.2. Compassion Experiment: Others-regarding Emotions 35
2.3. Neighborhood Experiment: Self-regarding Emotions 39
Ⅳ. Emotions in Political Attitudes 43
1. Public Discourse, Context, and Attitude 43
1.1. Sources and Types of Emotional Cues 43
1.2. Research Hypotheses 46
2. Impact of Emotion-laden Context 50
3. Political Significances of Emotions 59
3.1. Partisanship as Structural Background 59
3.1.1. Governmental Control of Labor Strike 59
3.1.2. Cooperation with China 64
3.2. Compassion as Tolerance for Alternatives 68
3.2.1. Corporal Punishment at School 69
3.2.2. Cooperation with Japan 74
3.3. Anxiety as Alert of Potential Loss 79
3.3.1. Nuclear Power Plant Construction 80
3.3.2. Public Rental Apartment 84
Ⅴ. Discussion 89
Appendix 92
Bibliography 99
국문초록 109
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dc.formatapplication/pdf-
dc.format.extent1313839 bytes-
dc.format.mediumapplication/pdf-
dc.language.isoen-
dc.publisher서울대학교 대학원-
dc.subjectEmotion-
dc.subjectPublic Opinion-
dc.subjectParty Identification-
dc.subjectCompassion-
dc.subjectAnxiety-
dc.subjectSurvey Experiment-
dc.subject.ddc320-
dc.titleEmotions in Political Attitudes: Long-held Partisanship, Compassionate Anger, and Self-regarding Anxiety in the Korean Public Opinion-
dc.title.alternative정치태도의 감정적 토대: 한국 대중여론에서 장기적 당파심, 공감적 분노, 개인적 불안감의 정치적 의미-
dc.typeThesis-
dc.contributor.AlternativeAuthorHwayong Shin-
dc.description.degreeMaster-
dc.citation.pages111-
dc.contributor.affiliation사회과학대학 정치외교학부-
dc.date.awarded2015-08-
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