Mean survey response by ideology.

Literary censorship is not new, but the recent resurgence in the U.S. differs from earlier post-war controversies, many of which were bipartisan and focused on protecting children from exposure to sexual and graphic material. Current censorship controversies in the U.S. appear to be much more partisan and ideological, focused on protecting children from politically offensive ideas. Anecdotally, the political right is portrayed as attacking literature in the name of conservative values like preserving the traditional family from alternative expressions of sexuality and sexual preference, with the left targeting material regarded as contrary to progressive values like tolerance of diverse cultural identities. However, these ideological rationales largely reflect the rhetoric of political activists and have not been empirically tested among the broader public. We conducted two studies designed to measure the polarization of support for literary censorship among the voting-age population of the U.S. Surprisingly, both studies cast doubt on the ideological divisions apparent in activist rhetoric. The survey findings from Study 1 indicate widespread opposition to literary censorship that spans ideological divisions, but both liberals and conservatives were more inclined to support censorship of materials that deviated from their respective values and beliefs. The experiment in Study 2 revealed differences in participants’ responses to liberal and conservative criticisms but little difference in the attitudes of liberal and conservative participants. However, liberals were marginally more likely than conservatives to agree with ideologically aligned literary criticism.文学审查并非新兴议题，但美国近期的审查回潮与战后早期的相关争议存在显著差异。彼时多数争议属两党共识范畴，核心目标为保护儿童免受色情及露骨内容的侵害；而当前美国的审查争议则愈发呈现党派化与意识形态化特征，其核心转向保护儿童免受带有政治冒犯性观点的内容影响。据传闻，右翼被塑造成以保守价值观为旗号打压文学作品的一方——例如以维护传统家庭为由，反对非传统性表达与性取向；左翼则将矛头对准被视为违背进步价值观的内容，例如缺乏对多元文化身份包容的材料。然而，这类意识形态化的理由在很大程度上仅反映了政治活动家的言论说辞，尚未在更广泛的公众群体中得到实证检验。本研究开展两项实验，旨在衡量美国投票年龄群体中支持文学审查的极化程度。令人意外的是，两项研究均对活动家言论中所呈现的意识形态分歧提出了质疑。研究1的调查结果显示，尽管存在意识形态分歧，但公众普遍反对文学审查；不过自由派与保守派均更倾向于支持审查违背自身价值观与信念的内容。研究2的实验结果显示，参与者对自由派与保守派批评的反应存在差异，但自由派与保守派参与者的整体态度并无显著区别。不过，相较于保守派，自由派略微更倾向于认同与自身意识形态相符的文学批评。