Political Talk and Attitude Stability during Election Campaigns

This paper explores the role of citizens’ embedding into social networks for the stability of political attitudes during election campaigns. In the run-up to elections, voters increasingly talk about politics and the campaign with others in their social surroundings. These exchanges with family, friends or acquaintances might provide them with both supportive and dissonant information impacting on how they perceive the political world. Apart from their information value, interpersonal exchanges can signal social (dis)approval and thus exert social pressure. The impact of political talk on attitude stability is compared to the one of individual attributes and predispositions (e.g. political sophistication). The paper uses a panel-study conducted in the run-up to the 2013 German Federal Election as part of the German Longitudinal Election Study (GLES) that combines measures of political talk and numerous political attitudes. The paper argues for a socially contextualized view on attitude stability and change during election campaigns.