Young British partisan attitudes to negative election campaign advertising: a Tri-Party perspective

This article presents an empirical investigation of young partisan first-time voter attitudes towards the use of negative attack advertising in a British general election. Partisanship, particularly in relation to negative advertising and third-party effects is significantly under-researched, yet it advances understanding of youth electoral interaction. Our study confirms that young British partisans are not passive recipients of information, but are actively involved in information processing, interpretation and counter arguing. Our findings also highlight a third party effect among young partisans in their evaluation of the attack advertising. Overall our young partisans broadly reject image-attack election ads, which raises a ‘health-warning’ on its use in future election campaigning. The findings of this study are of significant interest to election campaign strategists in their planning for future elections and to political researchers striving to advance understanding within the field of political marketing