Cengiz Erisen | Yeditepe University (original) (raw)

Papers by Cengiz Erisen

Political Psychology, 2024

Scholarly research on emotions tackles various domains, among which opposition to immigration ran... more Scholarly research on emotions tackles various domains, among which opposition to immigration ranks as socially and politically critical. While earlier literature captures distinct aspects of this domain, certain emotions are less studied than others, primarily compassion. By focusing on the unique role of compassion in comparison with anger and anxiety, we tackle how and under which conditions compassion changes social distancing and political preferences regarding refugees. Drawing on representative data collected in Turkey—the country with the highest number of Syrian refugees—we test whether feelings of compassion toward refugees can hold back the escalation in opposition to immigration as a result of heightened threat. Our results show that compassion functions as the key to lowering the negative effects of perceived threat in shaping refugees' social and political integration.

Social Indicators Research, 2016

Why divided societies face particular obstacles in maintaining democracy is one of the most chall... more Why divided societies face particular obstacles in maintaining democracy is one of the most challenging questions posed in the literature. Several studies posit that ethnically, religiously, and linguistically divided societies are incapable of establishing and holding a democratic system because of their social divisions and institutional weaknesses. We challenge this argument and examine whether political institutional arrangements (constraints over the executive, geographic distribution of political power, and form of government) in addition to economic performance are the crucial factors of success to establish and sustain a democratic regime and social unity in divided states. We use the Quality of Governance time-series standard dataset to test this hypothesis. By analyzing data on 163 states (1960–2012) we find that institutional constraints imposed over the executive and economic performance are the two primary influential factors in sustaining democratic regimes in multi-ethnic, multi-linguistic, and multi-religious societies.

Political Research Quarterly, 2014

We investigate strategic voting in proportional representation (PR) systems where parties are org... more We investigate strategic voting in proportional representation (PR) systems where parties are organized in pre-electoral coalitions and subject to a vote threshold. We show that such political systems are likely to generate coordination problems among the supporters of a coalition, and we examine voter behavior in this setting using a laboratory experiment with repeated rounds of elections. Our findings suggest that in absence of electoral history, voters cannot coordinate their efforts successfully and are more likely to vote sincerely. However, as history becomes available, the vote threshold induces strategic coordination on parties that performed best in previous elections.

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2017

Political psychologists have established that politically motivated reasoning is a common phenome... more Political psychologists have established that politically motivated reasoning is a common phenomenon; however, the field knows comparatively less about the psychological mechanisms that drive it. Drawing on advances in the understanding of the relevance of emotion to political reasoning and behavior, we argue that anger likely plays a major role in motivating individuals to engage in the biased assimilation of political information-an evaluative bias in favor of information that bolsters one's views and against information that undercuts them. We test this proposition with two online studies, the second of which includes a quasirepresentative sample of Americans. The studies support our expectations. Individuals felt more negative emotions toward arguments that undermined their attitudes and positive emotions toward arguments that confirmed them; however, anger was nearly alone in fueling biased reactions to issue arguments.

Journal of European Public Policy

What explains variation in European citizens' support for common EU immigration and counter-terro... more What explains variation in European citizens' support for common EU immigration and counter-terrorism policies? We advance extant literature that focuses on the utility versus identity debate by focusing on individuals' emotional reactions. Drawing on theories of affect, we show that citizens' emotions about immigration are integral to their preferences for EU cooperation on the dual questions of immigration and terrorism. We hypothesise that while anger about immigration is associated with opposition to cooperation on both policies, fear about immigration is associated with support for a common EU counter-terrorism strategy. Using a large-N crosssectional survey conducted in Germany and the Netherlands, our analyses confirm our hypotheses. Our findings have implications for the progress of European integration and the scope of public approval of EU common policies.

Political Behavior and the Emotional Citizen

American Politics Research

In this article, we explore whether incongruent information influences what people recall to mind... more In this article, we explore whether incongruent information influences what people recall to mind about a presidential candidate’s policy statements. We investigate whether the volume of people’s political thoughts, their ability to produce arguments, the affective valence of these thoughts, and their integrative complexity are influenced by the congruency between new political information and prior political convictions. We conducted an experiment via MTurk manipulating the congruency of information with respect to ideology. Our results show that incongruency significantly alters how people think about politics. Incongruent information increases integrative complexity of the opposing thoughts, becomes more voluminous, and includes more rationales. Moreover, these defensive thoughts are significantly more negative and less positive about the incongruent information. Parallel to what studies on motivated reasoning demonstrated, we also find that politically knowledgeable people in pa...

European Union Politics, 2017

The aim of this overview is to critically examine the state of research on the relationship betwe... more The aim of this overview is to critically examine the state of research on the relationship between anti-immigrant attitudes and attitudes toward European integration. We argue that the two most commonly used measures of anti-immigrant attitudes do not fully capture perceived threats from immigrants and opinion about different immigrant groups. Future research should pay more attention to two particular issues: first, scholars could employ methodological techniques that capture the underlying constructs associated with attitudes and public opinion; second, researchers could differentiate between groups within the overall immigrant population. This overview identifies themes in the literature while drawing attention to the need for more research on the behavioral underpinnings of anti-immigrant attitudes and public opinion on European integration.

European Union Politics, 2016

This article studies how different types of tolerance and perceived threat affect opinions about ... more This article studies how different types of tolerance and perceived threat affect opinions about the EU immigration policy in Germany and the Netherlands. We assess to what extent social and political tolerance for and sociotropic and personal threats from Muslim immigrants influence EU citizens’ beliefs that immigration is one of the most important issues facing the EU. By experimentally manipulating religion of immigrant, level of perceived threat, and type of tolerance, we examine how people’s attitudes on immigration policies change. Our findings shed light on how EU countries might deal with the rising tide of intolerance toward immigrants and Muslims, and how better policies of integration could be implemented in a multicultural Europe.

One of the most frequently evoked emotions on a daily basis is anger. Regardless of time and cont... more One of the most frequently evoked emotions on a daily basis is anger. Regardless of time and context, anger is a central emotion of action and motivation. Closely related with a number of high arousal negative emotions, such as hatred, disgust, feelings of revenge, and contempt, anger stands out among all with its neural and appraisal foundations and attitudinal and behavioral consequences. More importantly, anger differs from anxiety in essential aspects that place the two emotions in different dimensions. So far, various studies have demonstrated the potential consequences of anger (and its distinct nature from anxiety) across an array of domains including risk assessments, policy preferences, information processing and motivated biases, political participation, social media engagement, group relations and ethnocentrism, intractable conflicts and conflict resolution, and vote behavior. Some others have treated anger as a mediator or a moderator between prior attitudes and beliefs,...

Advances in Political Psychology, 2021

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creat ive Commo ns Attri butio n-NonCo mmer... more This is an open access article under the terms of the Creat ive Commo ns Attri butio n-NonCo mmerc ial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.

European Journal of Social Psychology, 2019

Denial of responsibility by perpetrator groups is the most common response to group‐based transgr... more Denial of responsibility by perpetrator groups is the most common response to group‐based transgressions. Refusal to acknowledge responsibility has dire consequences for intergroup relations. In this research we assessed whether shifting lay beliefs about group‐based transgressions in general influences acceptance of responsibility for a specific ingroup transgression. In two experimental studies we manipulated lay beliefs about group transgressions as reflecting either a group's stable character (i.e., a global defect construal) or a specific characteristic (i.e., a specific defect construal). Specific defect construals (compared to global defect construals) increased acceptance of ingroup responsibility by increasing group malleability beliefs, but reduced acceptance of ingroup responsibility by reducing ingroup's perceived moral failure. These effects were moderated by ingroup superiority in Study 1, but not Study 2. We draw implications for our understanding of mechanisms of denial of responsibility, identity threat, and coping with this threat.

Political psychologists have established that politically motivated reasoning is a common phenome... more Political psychologists have established that politically motivated reasoning is a common phenomenon;
however, the field knows comparatively less about the psychological mechanisms that drive it. Drawing on
advances in the understanding of the relevance of emotion to political reasoning and behavior, we argue that
anger likely plays a major role in motivating individuals to engage in the biased assimilation of political
information—an evaluative bias in favor of information that bolsters one’s views and against information that
undercuts them. We test this proposition with two online studies, the second of which includes a quasirepresentative
sample of Americans. The studies support our expectations. Individuals felt more negative
emotions toward arguments that undermined their attitudes and positive emotions toward arguments that
confirmed them; however, anger was nearly alone in fueling biased reactions to issue arguments.

Scholars have long explored why presidential rhetoric is important and how it matters for public ... more Scholars have long explored why presidential rhetoric is important and how it matters for public leadership and policy-making. However, relatively few works have considered the role that emotion plays in leadership communication and no research has conducted a thorough examination of the various types of emotions invoked in presidential rhetoric, their frequency, or how they have shaped presidential discourse over time. In this study, presidential speeches across 13 administrations are examined to provide a first assessment of the extent to which US presidents have invoked fear, anger, and hope across policy domains and key types of speeches.

This paper presents an unexplored method of mediation analysis, sequential mediation analysis. Se... more This paper presents an unexplored method of mediation analysis, sequential mediation analysis. Sequential mediation is promoted as an important tool in experiments designed to examine domino-effects in political behavior, as one treatment triggers a chain of reaction. I discuss how sequential mediation is a proper test of the theoretical assumptions of affect-driven dual process models and associative model of processing.

This article experimentally tests different political thinking conditions under which individuals... more This article experimentally tests different political thinking conditions under which individuals would cast their vote correctly. We find support for a consistent effect of the unnoticed affective primes in changing what one thinks, how one would think that a candidate is the preferred one, and how one could cast a vote correctly. Affect-evoked thoughts changed one’s preferences on a presidential candidate, one’s vote choice, and the probability of casting a vote correctly. As opposed to the understanding that affect has been shown to be a detriment for rational thinking and unbiased estimation, we find evidence that positive unnoticed influences in particular contribute to one’s chances of voting correctly.

The Great Catalyst: European Union Project and Lessons from Greece and Turkey, Jan 1, 2014

Voting Experiments, Sep 1, 2016

Whilst previous work on strategic voting emphasizes a number of factors with respect to voting ru... more Whilst previous work on strategic voting emphasizes a number of factors with respect to voting rules and structural issues in the electoral process there is limited research with respect to its individual determinants. We offer a novel approach to that end and employ an experiment to examine how Big Five personality traits (openness to experience, extraversion, conscientiousness, emotional stability, and agreeableness) influence one’s propensity to cast a vote tactically in PR elections with a threshold. Our findings show that openness to experience and emotional stability promote greater likelihood of strategic voting whereas agreeableness decreases that probability.

Political Psychology, 2024

Social Indicators Research, 2016

Political Research Quarterly, 2014

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2017

Journal of European Public Policy

Political Behavior and the Emotional Citizen

American Politics Research

European Union Politics, 2017

European Union Politics, 2016

Advances in Political Psychology, 2021

European Journal of Social Psychology, 2019

Political psychologists have established that politically motivated reasoning is a common phenome... more Political psychologists have established that politically motivated reasoning is a common phenomenon;
however, the field knows comparatively less about the psychological mechanisms that drive it. Drawing on
advances in the understanding of the relevance of emotion to political reasoning and behavior, we argue that
anger likely plays a major role in motivating individuals to engage in the biased assimilation of political
information—an evaluative bias in favor of information that bolsters one’s views and against information that
undercuts them. We test this proposition with two online studies, the second of which includes a quasirepresentative
sample of Americans. The studies support our expectations. Individuals felt more negative
emotions toward arguments that undermined their attitudes and positive emotions toward arguments that
confirmed them; however, anger was nearly alone in fueling biased reactions to issue arguments.

The Great Catalyst: European Union Project and Lessons from Greece and Turkey, Jan 1, 2014

Voting Experiments, Sep 1, 2016

This book studies the role of emotions, such as anger, anxiety, and enthusiasm, across various do... more This book studies the role of emotions, such as anger, anxiety, and enthusiasm, across various domains of political behavior in Turkey. The author considers how emotions affect evaluations of leadership performance, levels of intolerance, likelihood of following and participating in politics, perceived threats from terrorism, and electoral decisions, including vote choice. Using a nationally representative survey and experimental data, this study empirically analyses the causal associations among the primary factors explaining the Turkish electorate’s political attitudes and behaviour. The book will be of particular interest to academics, university students, and policymakers seeking to learn more about contemporary Turkish politics amid the recent political and social turmoil that has affected all parts of this society.