Partisan Social Identity Scale

The Partisan Social Identity Scale treats party identification as a social identity in the sense of Henri Tajfel rather than as a running tally of policy agreement. Building on Steven Greene's social-identity approach and crystallized in Huddy, Mason, and Aaroe's 2015 study of expressive partisanship, the scale adapts standard group-identification items to ask how central, important, and emotionally engaging a person's party is to their sense of self. Strongly identified partisans are shown to feel action-oriented emotions, anger when their side is threatened and enthusiasm when reassured, and to participate in campaigns more than issue-based measures of partisanship predict.