Ideal and anti-ideal as framing in political evaluations. Psychological analysis of political candidates in the theory of similarity

The main aim of this work is to present a new method of political evaluations that is grounded in Tversky’s contrast theory of similarity. The current study tested how comparisons to an ideal or anti-ideal politician moderated the evaluation of candidates whose images were defined by the strength and structure of positive and negative associations. Our study accounts for two key aspects of political behavior: the dependence on the point of reference and the associative structure of candidate image. Our approach was tested in the context of the 2016 US presidential elections, where Hilary Clinton and Donald Trump ran for the Presidential office. Although the study was conducted almost three years after the elections, its results still resembled the electoral behavior during the presidential campaign. The findings showed no differences between two politicians with regard to their similarity to an anti-ideal politician, however, they differed when compared to an ideal politician, with Clinton having more commonality with the ideal politician. Moreover, the activated category (ideal/ anti-ideal) moderated the evaluation of two opposing politicians. The results are discussed within the contrast model of similarity, pointing to the validity of our approach when used to analyze behavior in a political context.