Validating and testing a measure of anti-semitism on support for QAnon and vote intention for Trump in 2020

Abstract

Objective: Knowledge on anti-semitism and its effects as an attitude is limited. We seek to assess its relationship with other out-group measures and its predictive ability on political judgments. We seek to (a) study the properties of a measure of anti-semitism; (b) explore the relationship between anti-semitism and other frequently used measures of out-group attitudes; (c) assess the key demographic predictors of endorsement of anti-semitic beliefs; (d) evaluate the predictive ability of our measure of anti-semitism in models predicting support for the QAnon conspiracy theory and vote for Trump in the 2020 election. Data and Methods: This study utilizes two national online surveys fielded in January and August 2020 that are weighted to match the U.S. population. We utilize a Bayesian factor analytic approach to assess the relationship between various out-group measures. We also use regression analyses to predict the correlates of anti-semitism and to test the relationship between anti-semitism and support for QAnon and for Trump. Results: Our results show that anti-semitism shares more variance with xenophobia than anti-black prejudice suggesting that people tend to perceive Jews as national outsiders not as racial others. Furthermore, anti-semitism is a strong positive predictor of both support for QAnon and intent to vote for Donald Trump.