Reconsidering the Relationship between Anti-Immigration Attitudes and Radical Right-Wing Party Preferences Using Implicit Attitudes Measures

For decades, survey research has mostly used explicit measures. However, social psychology has considered implicit attitudes as additional predictors of citizens opinions. This study will adopt the Single Category Implicit Association Test (SC-IAT) to measure preferences for radical right-wing parties (RRP) and anti-immigration attitudes beyond direct self-reports. It is widely accepted, that anti-immigration attitudes are sound predictors of RRP preferences. However, so far it remains unclear how this relationships is altered if implicit attitudes are taken into account. Based on the concepts of social desirability bias and avoidance of cognitive dissonance, it is theorized, that direct measurements may have underestimated (through social desirability) or overestimated (through avoidance of cognitive dissonance) the connection between anti-immigration attitudes and support for RRPs. The present study will test these assumptions using a sample of 400 German citizens completing two SC-IAT, integrated in an online questionnaire. This is a preregistration of the article: Kleinert, M. (2023). Reconsidering the Relationship Between Anti-immigration Attitudes and Preferences for the AfD Using Implicit Attitudes Measures. Politische Vierteljahresschrift. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11615-023-00500-3 peerReviewed other