Benjamin R Warner
Biographic Data
| ID | 764612 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Benjamin R Warner |
| GIVEN NAMES | Benjamin R |
| FAMILY NAME | Warner |
| SIGNATURE | WARNER B R |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Missouri |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2405-4842 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 23 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 163 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 23 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2011 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
Podcasts, Conservative Identity Politics, and the 2024 Election
Partisan Cues, Anger, and Attitude Formation: Experiments on Partisan Motivated Reasoning
How the 2024 U.S. Presidential Debates Shaped Candidate Brand Associations
As the most-watched U.S. political events, televised presidential debates are primetime opportunities for candidates to market themselves to voters. We employ political marketing theory and the concept of candidate brands to measure the cognitive and attitudinal outcomes of viewing one of the 2024 general election presidential debates. Using survey data collected during each of the three debates—Biden/Trump in June, Harris/Trump in September, and…
The Illusion of Third-Party Support: Why Third-Party Candidates Struggle to Consolidate Disaffected Voters
Voters in the United States consistently express to pollsters that they would like a third-party option, yet third-party candidates rarely earn their votes. In this study, we demonstrate why expressed support for a third-party candidate does not match actual support because the inclination to vote for a third-party candidate does not align with a consistent political ideology. We utilize a novel experiment (N = 777) to demonstrate that, though th…
Partisan Identity and Affective Polarization in Presidential Debates
This study presents the results of a quasi-experiment to assess the effects of viewing the live televised general election presidential and vice-presidential campaign debates. We contribute to a growing empirical record on the polarizing effects of campaign debates by testing some contextual variables that have confounded past researchers. Specifically, we use Trump's aggressive first debate performance as a test-case of polarizing content and co…
Do Presidential Primary Debates Increase Political Polarization
This study presents the results of a quasi-experiment to assess the effects of viewing a strategically manipulated portion of a 2020 Democratic Primary debate. Our aim was to assess the polarizing potential of primary debates on both ingroup (Democratic) and outgroup (Republican) viewers. Viewing the primary debate resulted in less perceived closeness with members of the opposing political party, greater feelings of social distance, and more attr…
Intergroup Bias in Political Decision Making
Partisanship is a driving factor of vote choice; however, the mechanism of influence is nuanced. Political parties operate as social identities that motivate elaboration about a candidate and bias image perceptions. In other words, partisanship influences the way in which individuals process information and form political opinions. This influence stems from the processes of ingroup favoritism and outgroup denigration. The present study employs an…
Waiting for a Match: Mitigating Reactance in Prosocial Health Behavior Using Psychological Distance
This study examined how psychological distance, both social and temporal, can be leveraged in prosocial health behavior messages to mitigate perceived psychological reactance. Following the construal level and psychological reactance theories, we conducted a 2 × 2 between-subjects factorial design (N = 245), which manipulated naturalistic messages regarding a prosocial communications campaign. Structural equation modeling showed that far temporal…
Emotional Crisis Communication: The Effects of CEO’s Expression of Guilt and Anger on Organizational Reputation
Organizational crises are emotionally-charged occurrences for both organizations and their stakeholders. There has been a growing body of research on the effects of emotions on organizational outcomes such as reputation, forgiveness, and negative word-of-mouth. The current study seeks to contribute to this growing body of research in emotional crisis communication by investigating the role of discrete emotions in a crisis, and the effects of such…
Political difference and polarization in the family: The role of (non)accommodating communication for navigating identity differences
This study joins the relatively modest literature examining the effects of political disagreement in the family. We consider the effects of communication accommodation on shared family identity in the context political disagreement. To do this, we utilize survey responses from a quota-stratified sample of participants in an online panel ( N = 833) taken immediately after the contentious 2016 presidential election. We find that more disagreement a…
Learning from Presidential Debates: Who Learns the Most and Why
Perhaps one of the most well-established findings stemming from decades of research exploring the effects of televised presidential debates is that exposure to this “information-rich” source of campaign communication enables viewers’ acquisition of issue knowledge. However, certain individuals will benefit more from the debate viewing experience because differences in individual characteristics allow some to learn more than others. In this quasi-…
Reducing political polarization through narrative writing
This study proposes two complementary writing activities designed to reduce affective polarization and malevolent outgroup attributions. The strategies draw on narrative theorizing and intergroup contact theory. Our intervention is low cost and can be effectively administrated in educational settings to combat the deleterious effects of political polarization. In this four-group between-subjects randomized experiment (n = 179), we found that a fi…
Posttraumatic Stress Related to the Killing of Michael Brown and Resulting Civil Unrest in Ferguson, Missouri: Roles of Protest Engagement, Media Use, Race, and Resilience
Objective: A significant body of research has examined the psychological harm of exposure to collective traumas such as disasters (e.g., tornados, hurricanes, mass violence). Less well studied are the mental health effects of exposure to macro-level race-related traumas, such as instances of police violence toward African Americans and subsequent civil unrest that are widely covered by traditional and social media. Method: This study examined pos…
Can Interparty Contact Reduce Affective Polarization? A Systematic Test of Different Forms of Intergroup Contact
We advance interparty contact as a remedy to affective polarization and examine the processes through which interparty contact attenuates the hostility between Democrats and Republicans. We present results from three studies: (1) a survey examining the association between outparty friendships and affective polarization (cross-validated with a representative data from Pew Research Center), and two experiments, testing the effects of (2) vicarious …
Reconsidering partisanship as a constraint on the persuasive effects of debates
This study tests persuasive effects of 30 debate performances drawn from samples (n = 5780) of 22 states over four election cycles (2004–2016). We test partisanship of the candidate, type of debate (presidential or vice-presidential), gender of the candidate, whether it was the first debate of the cycle, and whether it was a town-hall debate as possible moderators. Results reveal that viewers are likely to perceive their inparty candidate more fa…
Comic Agonism in the 2016 Campaign: A Study of Iowa Caucus Rallies
In this study, we assess the extent to which attending a candidate rally was associated with distrust of democratic institutions, epistemic rigidity, attribution of malevolent intentions to the political outgroup, and acceptance of political violence. Surveys ( N = 251) were distributed at rallies the night before and day of the 2016 Iowa Caucuses. Results suggest that attendees of rallies for Bernie Sanders or Donald Trump were more likely to di…
A Multimedia Analysis of Persuasion in the 2016 Presidential Election: Comparing the Unique and Complementary Effects of Political Comedy and Political Advertising
In this study, we test the indirect and conditional persuasive effects of a broadcast media echo chamber by combining political campaign attack ads with mockery and criticism on a late-night comedy program. A randomized experiment was conducted in which participants (N = 559) were assigned to view one of four reconstructed episodes of Late Night with Seth Meyers: (a) anti-Trump comedy with anti-Trump campaign ads, (b) anti-Trump comedy with nonpo…
Expanding the conceptual and empirical boundaries of family communication patterns: The development and validation of an Expanded Conformity Orientation Scale
Family communication patterns theory (FCPT) explores how family members communicate to create a shared social reality via conversation and conformity orientations. Recently, scholars have noted that the current conceptualization and operationalization of conformity orientation is unnecessarily narrow in scope by representing conformity as controlling and repressive, rather than as cultivating homogenous attitudes, beliefs, and values among family…
A test of imagined contact as a means to improve cross-partisan feelings and reduce attribution of malevolence and acceptance of political violence
In this study, we test the depolarizing potential of intrapersonal communication through imagined intergroup political contact. A randomized experiment was embedded into a quota-stratified online survey distributed to 583 U.S. adults drawn from an online panel proportioned to match the U.S. population. Structural equation modeling was used to test the direct, indirect, and conditional effects of imagined contact. We found that imagined contact wi…
Tweeting Presidential Primary Debates: Debate Processing Through Motivated Twitter Instruction
Researchers have noted that an individual's processing of political media messages occurs through various filters including partisanship, interest, and cynicism. The phenomenon of motivated processing, however, is understudied particularly in the context of televised presidential debates. As major campaign events, presidential debates have been linked to increases in viewers' political knowledge, political information efficacy, and changes in can…
A dual-processing approach to the effects of viewing political comedy
Stephen Colbert’s announcement that he would take over
Gender Identification and Young Voters: Predicting Candidate Evaluations and Message Effectiveness
The 2012 election was marked by discussions of women's issues from abortion to equal pay, and both presidential candidates employed strategies designed to win female voters. Since women vote in larger numbers than men and are more likely to be swing voters, it was imperative that the candidates win support among women. This study draws from group identification theories to better understand the process of gender socialization that influences youn…
Will the "Real" Candidates for President and Vice President Please Stand Up? 2008 Pre- and Post-Debate Viewer Perceptions of Candidate Image
This study of the 2008 first presidential and vice presidential debate builds on past research on viewers' perceptions of candidate images. Going back to the Kennedy-Nixon debates in 1960, image research has been conducted in most presidential election cycles. Findings consistently show that viewers enter the debates with perceptions of candidates' character and leadership qualities and that the debates tend to reinforce rather than change images…
Can Interparty Contact Reduce Affective Polarization? A Systematic Test of Different Forms of Intergroup Contact
We advance interparty contact as a remedy to affective polarization and examine the processes through which interparty contact attenuates the hostility between Democrats and Republicans. We present results from three studies: (1) a survey examining the association between outparty friendships and affective polarization (cross-validated with a representative data from Pew Research Center), and two experiments, testing the effects of (2) vicarious …
Political difference and polarization in the family: The role of (non)accommodating communication for navigating identity differences
This study joins the relatively modest literature examining the effects of political disagreement in the family. We consider the effects of communication accommodation on shared family identity in the context political disagreement. To do this, we utilize survey responses from a quota-stratified sample of participants in an online panel ( N = 833) taken immediately after the contentious 2016 presidential election. We find that more disagreement a…
Expanding the conceptual and empirical boundaries of family communication patterns: The development and validation of an Expanded Conformity Orientation Scale
Family communication patterns theory (FCPT) explores how family members communicate to create a shared social reality via conversation and conformity orientations. Recently, scholars have noted that the current conceptualization and operationalization of conformity orientation is unnecessarily narrow in scope by representing conformity as controlling and repressive, rather than as cultivating homogenous attitudes, beliefs, and values among family…
A test of imagined contact as a means to improve cross-partisan feelings and reduce attribution of malevolence and acceptance of political violence
In this study, we test the depolarizing potential of intrapersonal communication through imagined intergroup political contact. A randomized experiment was embedded into a quota-stratified online survey distributed to 583 U.S. adults drawn from an online panel proportioned to match the U.S. population. Structural equation modeling was used to test the direct, indirect, and conditional effects of imagined contact. We found that imagined contact wi…
Reconsidering partisanship as a constraint on the persuasive effects of debates
This study tests persuasive effects of 30 debate performances drawn from samples (n = 5780) of 22 states over four election cycles (2004–2016). We test partisanship of the candidate, type of debate (presidential or vice-presidential), gender of the candidate, whether it was the first debate of the cycle, and whether it was a town-hall debate as possible moderators. Results reveal that viewers are likely to perceive their inparty candidate more fa…
Will the "Real" Candidates for President and Vice President Please Stand Up? 2008 Pre- and Post-Debate Viewer Perceptions of Candidate Image
This study of the 2008 first presidential and vice presidential debate builds on past research on viewers' perceptions of candidate images. Going back to the Kennedy-Nixon debates in 1960, image research has been conducted in most presidential election cycles. Findings consistently show that viewers enter the debates with perceptions of candidates' character and leadership qualities and that the debates tend to reinforce rather than change images…
Posttraumatic Stress Related to the Killing of Michael Brown and Resulting Civil Unrest in Ferguson, Missouri: Roles of Protest Engagement, Media Use, Race, and Resilience
Objective: A significant body of research has examined the psychological harm of exposure to collective traumas such as disasters (e.g., tornados, hurricanes, mass violence). Less well studied are the mental health effects of exposure to macro-level race-related traumas, such as instances of police violence toward African Americans and subsequent civil unrest that are widely covered by traditional and social media. Method: This study examined pos…
Emotional Crisis Communication: The Effects of CEO’s Expression of Guilt and Anger on Organizational Reputation
Organizational crises are emotionally-charged occurrences for both organizations and their stakeholders. There has been a growing body of research on the effects of emotions on organizational outcomes such as reputation, forgiveness, and negative word-of-mouth. The current study seeks to contribute to this growing body of research in emotional crisis communication by investigating the role of discrete emotions in a crisis, and the effects of such…
Comic Agonism in the 2016 Campaign: A Study of Iowa Caucus Rallies
In this study, we assess the extent to which attending a candidate rally was associated with distrust of democratic institutions, epistemic rigidity, attribution of malevolent intentions to the political outgroup, and acceptance of political violence. Surveys ( N = 251) were distributed at rallies the night before and day of the 2016 Iowa Caucuses. Results suggest that attendees of rallies for Bernie Sanders or Donald Trump were more likely to di…
Tweeting Presidential Primary Debates: Debate Processing Through Motivated Twitter Instruction
Researchers have noted that an individual's processing of political media messages occurs through various filters including partisanship, interest, and cynicism. The phenomenon of motivated processing, however, is understudied particularly in the context of televised presidential debates. As major campaign events, presidential debates have been linked to increases in viewers' political knowledge, political information efficacy, and changes in can…
A dual-processing approach to the effects of viewing political comedy
Stephen Colbert’s announcement that he would take over
Gender Identification and Young Voters: Predicting Candidate Evaluations and Message Effectiveness
The 2012 election was marked by discussions of women's issues from abortion to equal pay, and both presidential candidates employed strategies designed to win female voters. Since women vote in larger numbers than men and are more likely to be swing voters, it was imperative that the candidates win support among women. This study draws from group identification theories to better understand the process of gender socialization that influences youn…
Partisan Cues, Anger, and Attitude Formation: Experiments on Partisan Motivated Reasoning
Partisan Identity and Affective Polarization in Presidential Debates
This study presents the results of a quasi-experiment to assess the effects of viewing the live televised general election presidential and vice-presidential campaign debates. We contribute to a growing empirical record on the polarizing effects of campaign debates by testing some contextual variables that have confounded past researchers. Specifically, we use Trump's aggressive first debate performance as a test-case of polarizing content and co…
A Multimedia Analysis of Persuasion in the 2016 Presidential Election: Comparing the Unique and Complementary Effects of Political Comedy and Political Advertising
In this study, we test the indirect and conditional persuasive effects of a broadcast media echo chamber by combining political campaign attack ads with mockery and criticism on a late-night comedy program. A randomized experiment was conducted in which participants (N = 559) were assigned to view one of four reconstructed episodes of Late Night with Seth Meyers: (a) anti-Trump comedy with anti-Trump campaign ads, (b) anti-Trump comedy with nonpo…
Will the "Real" Candidates for President and Vice President Please Stand Up? 2008 Pre- and Post-Debate Viewer Perceptions of Candidate Image
This study of the 2008 first presidential and vice presidential debate builds on past research on viewers' perceptions of candidate images. Going back to the Kennedy-Nixon debates in 1960, image research has been conducted in most presidential election cycles. Findings consistently show that viewers enter the debates with perceptions of candidates' character and leadership qualities and that the debates tend to reinforce rather than change images…
Gender Identification and Young Voters: Predicting Candidate Evaluations and Message Effectiveness
The 2012 election was marked by discussions of women's issues from abortion to equal pay, and both presidential candidates employed strategies designed to win female voters. Since women vote in larger numbers than men and are more likely to be swing voters, it was imperative that the candidates win support among women. This study draws from group identification theories to better understand the process of gender socialization that influences youn…
A dual-processing approach to the effects of viewing political comedy
Stephen Colbert’s announcement that he would take over
A test of imagined contact as a means to improve cross-partisan feelings and reduce attribution of malevolence and acceptance of political violence
In this study, we test the depolarizing potential of intrapersonal communication through imagined intergroup political contact. A randomized experiment was embedded into a quota-stratified online survey distributed to 583 U.S. adults drawn from an online panel proportioned to match the U.S. population. Structural equation modeling was used to test the direct, indirect, and conditional effects of imagined contact. We found that imagined contact wi…
Tweeting Presidential Primary Debates: Debate Processing Through Motivated Twitter Instruction
Researchers have noted that an individual's processing of political media messages occurs through various filters including partisanship, interest, and cynicism. The phenomenon of motivated processing, however, is understudied particularly in the context of televised presidential debates. As major campaign events, presidential debates have been linked to increases in viewers' political knowledge, political information efficacy, and changes in can…
A Multimedia Analysis of Persuasion in the 2016 Presidential Election: Comparing the Unique and Complementary Effects of Political Comedy and Political Advertising
In this study, we test the indirect and conditional persuasive effects of a broadcast media echo chamber by combining political campaign attack ads with mockery and criticism on a late-night comedy program. A randomized experiment was conducted in which participants (N = 559) were assigned to view one of four reconstructed episodes of Late Night with Seth Meyers: (a) anti-Trump comedy with anti-Trump campaign ads, (b) anti-Trump comedy with nonpo…
Expanding the conceptual and empirical boundaries of family communication patterns: The development and validation of an Expanded Conformity Orientation Scale
Family communication patterns theory (FCPT) explores how family members communicate to create a shared social reality via conversation and conformity orientations. Recently, scholars have noted that the current conceptualization and operationalization of conformity orientation is unnecessarily narrow in scope by representing conformity as controlling and repressive, rather than as cultivating homogenous attitudes, beliefs, and values among family…
Reconsidering partisanship as a constraint on the persuasive effects of debates
This study tests persuasive effects of 30 debate performances drawn from samples (n = 5780) of 22 states over four election cycles (2004–2016). We test partisanship of the candidate, type of debate (presidential or vice-presidential), gender of the candidate, whether it was the first debate of the cycle, and whether it was a town-hall debate as possible moderators. Results reveal that viewers are likely to perceive their inparty candidate more fa…
Comic Agonism in the 2016 Campaign: A Study of Iowa Caucus Rallies
In this study, we assess the extent to which attending a candidate rally was associated with distrust of democratic institutions, epistemic rigidity, attribution of malevolent intentions to the political outgroup, and acceptance of political violence. Surveys ( N = 251) were distributed at rallies the night before and day of the 2016 Iowa Caucuses. Results suggest that attendees of rallies for Bernie Sanders or Donald Trump were more likely to di…
Learning from Presidential Debates: Who Learns the Most and Why
Perhaps one of the most well-established findings stemming from decades of research exploring the effects of televised presidential debates is that exposure to this “information-rich” source of campaign communication enables viewers’ acquisition of issue knowledge. However, certain individuals will benefit more from the debate viewing experience because differences in individual characteristics allow some to learn more than others. In this quasi-…
Reducing political polarization through narrative writing
This study proposes two complementary writing activities designed to reduce affective polarization and malevolent outgroup attributions. The strategies draw on narrative theorizing and intergroup contact theory. Our intervention is low cost and can be effectively administrated in educational settings to combat the deleterious effects of political polarization. In this four-group between-subjects randomized experiment (n = 179), we found that a fi…
Posttraumatic Stress Related to the Killing of Michael Brown and Resulting Civil Unrest in Ferguson, Missouri: Roles of Protest Engagement, Media Use, Race, and Resilience
Objective: A significant body of research has examined the psychological harm of exposure to collective traumas such as disasters (e.g., tornados, hurricanes, mass violence). Less well studied are the mental health effects of exposure to macro-level race-related traumas, such as instances of police violence toward African Americans and subsequent civil unrest that are widely covered by traditional and social media. Method: This study examined pos…
Can Interparty Contact Reduce Affective Polarization? A Systematic Test of Different Forms of Intergroup Contact
We advance interparty contact as a remedy to affective polarization and examine the processes through which interparty contact attenuates the hostility between Democrats and Republicans. We present results from three studies: (1) a survey examining the association between outparty friendships and affective polarization (cross-validated with a representative data from Pew Research Center), and two experiments, testing the effects of (2) vicarious …
Political difference and polarization in the family: The role of (non)accommodating communication for navigating identity differences
This study joins the relatively modest literature examining the effects of political disagreement in the family. We consider the effects of communication accommodation on shared family identity in the context political disagreement. To do this, we utilize survey responses from a quota-stratified sample of participants in an online panel ( N = 833) taken immediately after the contentious 2016 presidential election. We find that more disagreement a…
Emotional Crisis Communication: The Effects of CEO’s Expression of Guilt and Anger on Organizational Reputation
Organizational crises are emotionally-charged occurrences for both organizations and their stakeholders. There has been a growing body of research on the effects of emotions on organizational outcomes such as reputation, forgiveness, and negative word-of-mouth. The current study seeks to contribute to this growing body of research in emotional crisis communication by investigating the role of discrete emotions in a crisis, and the effects of such…
Intergroup Bias in Political Decision Making
Partisanship is a driving factor of vote choice; however, the mechanism of influence is nuanced. Political parties operate as social identities that motivate elaboration about a candidate and bias image perceptions. In other words, partisanship influences the way in which individuals process information and form political opinions. This influence stems from the processes of ingroup favoritism and outgroup denigration. The present study employs an…
Waiting for a Match: Mitigating Reactance in Prosocial Health Behavior Using Psychological Distance
This study examined how psychological distance, both social and temporal, can be leveraged in prosocial health behavior messages to mitigate perceived psychological reactance. Following the construal level and psychological reactance theories, we conducted a 2 × 2 between-subjects factorial design (N = 245), which manipulated naturalistic messages regarding a prosocial communications campaign. Structural equation modeling showed that far temporal…
Do Presidential Primary Debates Increase Political Polarization
This study presents the results of a quasi-experiment to assess the effects of viewing a strategically manipulated portion of a 2020 Democratic Primary debate. Our aim was to assess the polarizing potential of primary debates on both ingroup (Democratic) and outgroup (Republican) viewers. Viewing the primary debate resulted in less perceived closeness with members of the opposing political party, greater feelings of social distance, and more attr…
Partisan Cues, Anger, and Attitude Formation: Experiments on Partisan Motivated Reasoning
How the 2024 U.S. Presidential Debates Shaped Candidate Brand Associations
As the most-watched U.S. political events, televised presidential debates are primetime opportunities for candidates to market themselves to voters. We employ political marketing theory and the concept of candidate brands to measure the cognitive and attitudinal outcomes of viewing one of the 2024 general election presidential debates. Using survey data collected during each of the three debates—Biden/Trump in June, Harris/Trump in September, and…
The Illusion of Third-Party Support: Why Third-Party Candidates Struggle to Consolidate Disaffected Voters
Voters in the United States consistently express to pollsters that they would like a third-party option, yet third-party candidates rarely earn their votes. In this study, we demonstrate why expressed support for a third-party candidate does not match actual support because the inclination to vote for a third-party candidate does not align with a consistent political ideology. We utilize a novel experiment (N = 777) to demonstrate that, though th…
Partisan Identity and Affective Polarization in Presidential Debates
This study presents the results of a quasi-experiment to assess the effects of viewing the live televised general election presidential and vice-presidential campaign debates. We contribute to a growing empirical record on the polarizing effects of campaign debates by testing some contextual variables that have confounded past researchers. Specifically, we use Trump's aggressive first debate performance as a test-case of polarizing content and co…
Podcasts, Conservative Identity Politics, and the 2024 Election
Politics (19 works) · Psychology (18 works) · Political science (17 works) · Social Psychology (17 works) · Law (13 works) · Social and Intergroup Psychology (12 works) · Social Media and Politics (11 works) · Presidential system (10 works) · Electoral Systems and Political Participation (9 works) · Social Psychology (9 works)