Political Leaders, the Display of Emotions, and the Public

Emotions have always been considered an important element of political communication. Recent research has demonstrated the significance of emotions in individual information-processing and political judgements. Used strategically, emotions thus become an instrument for influencing people. Based on content analyses of TV news and political talk shows in Germany, this book analyses with which emotions television portrays politicians and which techniques are used to trigger emotions in viewers. Using experiments, it investigates how portraying emotional politicians can affect political attitudes against the background of the theory of emotional contagion.