Metaphors, political knowledge and the basic income debate in Belgium: an experimental study of the framing impact of metaphors on political representations
metaphorical reasoning; basic income; experiment; political knowledge; political metaphor
Abstract :
[en] The framing effect of political discourses has long been attested for. Metaphors in particular are known to ease the understanding of complex concepts and processes. Yet, the question remains to what extent metaphors do work the same on different recipients? Based on an experimental design, we test a potentially important moderating variable in the study of political metaphors: political knowledge. Our experiment aims at determining the extent to which the confrontation of individuals to arguments and metaphors impacts their preferences regarding the implementation of a basic income in Belgium. In particular, we hypothesize that the marginal effect of metaphors as cognitive shortcuts decreases when political knowledge increases. We conclude that political knowledge is an important variable when analyzing the framing effect of metaphors, especially when it goes about very low or very high levels of political knowledge. Our findings suggest that the insertion of metaphors in political discourses may succeed in rallying individuals behind a given cause, but this would only work if participants have a lower knowledge of politics.
Research Center/Unit :
Lilith - Liège, Literature, Linguistics - ULiège
Disciplines :
Languages & linguistics
Author, co-author :
Vandeleene, Audrey; UGent - Ghent University [BE]
Randour, François; UNamur - Université de Namur [BE]
Dodeigne, Jérémy; UNamur - Université de Namur [BE]
Heyvaert, Pauline ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Département de langues modernes : linguistique, littérature et traduction > Langue néerlandaise moderne et linguistique synchronique
Legein, Thomas; ULB - Université Libre de Bruxelles [BE]
Perrez, Julien ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Lilith - Liège, Literature, Linguistics ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Département de langues modernes : linguistique, littérature et traduction > Langue néerlandaise moderne et linguistique synchronique
Reuchamps, Min; UCL - Université Catholique de Louvain [BE]
Language :
English
Title :
Metaphors, political knowledge and the basic income debate in Belgium: an experimental study of the framing impact of metaphors on political representations
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