Identity-framed party items built for two-party systems misfire in multiparty systems.

Evidence

Bankert (2021) proposes a shorter version of the eight items scale, composed of three items. Although the instrument is reliable when used in the USA (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.84), one of the items she employs (When I talk about this party, I use ‘they’ instead than ‘we’) worked quite poorly both in our cognitive interviews and in the survey (see Sect. 3). A possible reason is that her measure is tested on a US sample, with respondents having in mind a two-party system, whilst in a multiparty system party identification can be more fluid and fragmented. — Sabrina J. Mayer and Luana Russo, What one is not, 13

Categorization

• XREF: Directly relevant to the We-They Engine thread — the ‘they vs we’ item pattern failing outside a two-party frame is a caution to adapt identity measures to multi-party settings. — connects to: Identity-based actions can reshape political power structures without being intended as political — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4416; Collective identity can have unintended political repercussions without becoming politicized

Broader Connections

• Collective identity can have unintended political repercussions without becoming politicized #corroborates (0.73)
• Identity-based actions can reshape political power structures without being intended as political #expands (0.72) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4416