Stick to Sports”: Evidence from Sports Media on the Origins and Consequences of Newly Politicized Attitudes
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\Stick to Sports": Evidence from Sports Media on the Origins and Consequences of Newly Politicized Attitudes Erik Peterson and Manuela Mu~noz∗ Texas A&M University Department of Political Science July 1, 2020 Abstract Politics now intrudes into many aspects of social and economic life. How does this politicization occur? We consider two pathways. In one, political elites intro- duce new considerations into an apolitical setting. In the other, public reactions to a formerly non-political entity produce politicization without elite guidance. We use these perspectives to study the origins of politicized attitudes towards ESPN, a major sports media outlet involved in recent controversies where poli- tics and sports intersect. We find evidence politicization is a top-down process driven by political elites. In survey-linked web browsing data and a survey exper- iment, exposure to political media leads the public to evaluate ESPN in political terms. In contrast, ESPN's typical sports coverage fails to produce politiciza- tion. We also find these newly politicized attitudes do not reduce use of ESPN, showing the intrusion of politics into an apolitical setting may not displace other considerations underlying behavior. ∗Corresponding author email: [email protected]. Erik Peterson is an Assistant Professor of Polit- ical Science at Texas A&M University. Manuela Mu~nozis a graduate student in Political Science at Texas A&M University. The authors thank Allison Archer, Johanna Dunaway and Maxwell Allamong for their comments and Texas A&M's College of Liberal Arts, the Bill Lane Center for the American West, the Hoover Institution, and the Knight Foundation for financial support. The boundary between political and non-political aspects of daily life is porous and con- tested. Researchers have long sought to define this border (Lane 1962, Brody and Sniderman 1977, Verba et al. 1995, Fitzgerald 2013, Settle 2018) and understand the \political trans- lation" that expands the settings in which political attitudes are relevant (Campbell et al. 1960, 29-32). Politics now intrudes into many seemingly apolitical decisions, with expansive implica- tions for social and economic life. Studies of affective polarization demonstrate the public's affinity for co-partisans, and dislike of their opponents (e.g., Mason 2018, Iyengar et al. 2019), spills into their relationships, religious practice, health care use and economic decisions (Hu- ber and Malhotra 2017, Margolis 2017, Lerman et al. 2017, McConnell et al. 2018, Kam 2020, Krupenkin ND, Panagopoulous et al. 2020). Similarly, political consumerism research shows politics can affect attitudes towards products (Kam and Deichert 2020, DellaPosta et al. 2015, Newman and Bartels 2011, Shah et al. 2007). Yet, fundamental questions about this process remain unanswered. In many instances politicization occurs after researchers introduce political cues into an apolitical setting (e.g., Gift and Gift 2015, Iyengar and Westwood 2015, Nicholson et al. 2016, Banda et al. ND, Shafranek ND). This offers limited insight into factors that might bring about politicization in areas of life where such direct political cues are unavailable (but see Kam 2020, Allamong 2020). Many studies also assess politicization using attitudinal measures. This leaves the implications of newly politicized attitudes unclear, as they may not be relevant for behavior when offset by more familiar apolitical decision-making criteria in these domains. How does politicization happen? We theorize two avenues through which it may occur. First, politicization may be a \top-down" process facilitated by messages from politicians and political media that introduce political considerations into assessments of people, orga- nizations and settings the public previously considered without attention to these points. Second, politicization may happen \bottom-up" if experience with an apolitical entity leads 1 the public to assess it in political terms without elite guidance.1 We test these perspectives by studying public opinion towards ESPN, a major sports news outlet (for studies of the intersection of sports and politics, see Healy et al. 2010, Busby et al. 2017, Thorson and Serazio 2018, Alrababa'h et al. 2019, Towler et al. 2020, Engelhardt and Utych ND). ESPN has recently been part of a broader debate about whether athletes and sports media should engage with political issues or avoid politics and \stick to sports" (e.g., Serazio and Thorson 2020). A partisan divide in assessments of the sports network has developed, with Republicans more likely to evaluate ESPN negatively and perceive it as liberal compared to Democrats (Clavio and Vooris 2018). This politicized reputation is cited as a contributor to the network's economic struggles (Ramachandran 2018). We focus on explaining the sources of politicized attitudes towards ESPN using an obser- vational study of survey-linked web browsing data and a survey experiment. This provides support for top-down politicization. Across both studies, exposure to critiques of ESPN from right-leaning political media leads the public to evaluate the sports network in politi- cal terms. In contrast, ESPN's typical sports coverage fails to politicize evaluations of the network. The survey experiment provides evidence that bottom-up politicization can occur; sports news foregrounding political and social issues does generate politicization. However, in a content analysis politicized sports coverage is a minuscule share of the news ESPN produces suggesting that, relative to political media, it makes a small contribution to politicization. We also consider the consequences of these politicized attitudes. We find those holding politicized assessments of ESPN are no less willing than others to consume its coverage in choice tasks in our surveys. Interest in sports, not partisanship or politicized attitudes, is the main predictor of use. In the browsing data, there is no evidence of a partisan divide in web traffic to ESPN's website. This shows the introduction of political factors failed to displace non-political considerations underlying behavior. 1 Our distinction borrows from Kertzer and Zeitoff's (2017) discussion of the sources of foreign policy attitudes. 2 Our findings contribute to understanding elite-driven opinion formation, affective po- larization and political consumerism. We demonstrate the influence of political elites and partisan media extends beyond the public's policy views (e.g., Levendusky 2013, Bisgaard and Slothuus 2018, Barber and Pope 2019, De Benedictis-Kessner et al. 2019) and as- sessments of political media (Archer ND, Peterson and Kagalwala 2019, Ladd 2012) into non-political contexts. Political media exposure is crucial, as encounters with typical forms of sports coverage do not produce politicization. Our evidence casts doubt on politicization as a source of ESPN's economic struggles, as politicized attitudes do not translate into an aversion to consuming the network's sports coverage. Here, established habits (i.e, interest in sports) and the typical absence of political cues when consuming sports coverage limited the behavioral consequences of politicization. This reinforces the need to assess both attitudes and behavior to understand the full impact of politicization. Defining Politicization We use a definition of politicization that encompasses two aspects of academic and popu- lar discussion. First, politicization occurs when the public associates an entity with politics, broadly speaking, or certain political concepts. This follows work asking people to determine whether various issues are political (Fitzgerald 2013) and to assess the perceived association of brands and hobbies with partisanship (Settle 2018). Second, politicization occurs when political attitudes predict opinion towards a formerly apolitical entity. This follows discussion of political translation in The American Voter describing the association between partisanship and views of Dwight Eisenhower that devel- oped as he moved from war hero to partisan presidential nominee (Campbell et al. 1960, 29-32). This notion has contemporary relevance given the relationship between partisanship and brand assessments (Hetherington and Weiler 2018, DellaPosta et al. 2015, Shah et al. 2007) and evidence partisan cues affect non-political decisions, such as economic transactions (McConnell et al. 2018, Engelhardt and Utych ND, Panagopoulous et al. 2020). There are clear operationalizations of each aspect of politicization in the case we focus on. 3 Under the first, we will say attitudes towards ESPN are politicized if members of the public evaluate the sports network as having an ideological slant, similar to assessments they might make about political media. Using the second, we will consider attitudes towards ESPN to be politicized if political variables, such as partisanship or political media use, predict how favorably people evaluate the sports network.2 Pathways to Politicization In previous work, political attitudes gain relevance in non-political settings after re- searchers introduce clear and direct political cues. For instance, if job seekers and scholar- ship applicants indicate their party affiliation on a resume, it affects how they are evaluated (Iyengar and Westwood 2015, Gift and Gift 2015). This shows politics can matter in such situations, but the generalizability of these findings to other aspects of everyday life is un- clear. People routinely disguise their political views to avoid negative reactions in social settings (Settle