Changes in Psychological Well-Being and Personality due to Elections
While it has long been known that personal life events, such as a divorce or losing one’s job, can impact a person’s well-being and personality, this has hardly been investigated with respect to political events. A recent study that Professor Olga Stavrova, holder of the Chair of Social Psychology and Micro-Sociology at the University of Mannheim, conducted together with Professor Dongning Ren from Maastricht University as well as Professor Kathleen Vohs and Sangmin Kim from the University of Minnesota, shows the psychological changes voters observed in themselves after the 2024 US presidential election.
From three weeks before until 16 weeks after the election, more than 700 people were each surveyed seven times in total. When the election results were announced, supporters of the Democrats, who had lost the election, reported a decrease in well-being, optimism, and personal control beliefs. They felt they were more cynical and stated that they were experiencing more disrespect and increasingly developing a conspiracy mentality. In addition, the high level of institutional trust among Democratic supporters prior to the election declined rapidly afterward. All these changes were still measurable up to four months after the election.
In contrast, Republican supporters experienced changes in the opposite direction: they reported an increase in well-being, personal control beliefs, and optimism and took a more positive view of the world and society, which was reflected by higher institutional trust, less cynicism, fewer experiences of disrespect, and a decrease in conspiracy mentality.
The results also show that the election was accompanied by changes in other personality traits, including self-views and worldviews—especially on the election losers’ side. “Most of the findings suggested that losing an election was more likely to result in changes than winning one—not only at an emotional level but also with respect to how people experience and evaluate societal reality,” Stavrova explains. “Our contribution shows: If their preferred candidate loses an election, many people do not only experience a shift in their mood but also in the ‘map’ of their societal reality. The outcome of the election was accompanied by comprehensive changes in how people see, interpret, and evaluate the world—encompassing far more than mere effects on well-being.”