Fear and Loathing in White America: The Effects of Group Threat on Political Attitudes and Perceptions

Abstract

The U.S. population is rapidly changing with recent projections showing that soon whites will no longer be the majority. This information, when shown to white Americans, can generate a sense of threat. Across the three studies of this dissertation, I frame this group threat (i.e., a change in the demographic status of a group such as whites becoming a numerical minority) in temporally different ways. Ultimately, I find that information about demographic change can affect various political and policy-oriented attitudes (the minimum wage, education policy, and climate change mitigation) in unexpected ways.