Who vs. what? Consistency of a politician’s brand in shaping voters’ preferences

In this article we focus on the politician’s brand and how it develops in the voter’s mind. Specifically, we examine how priming a candidate’s image or issue traits influences how individuals update their beliefs about a candidate, and in what way the consistency of image traits and issue traits affects this evaluation. The results from a two-factor design (message: consistent vs. inconsistent) × (information order: image first vs. issue first) suggest that sequential dissemination of information about the candidate’s issue positions, followed by image information (consistent with the program or not) results in a more positive evaluation of the candidate.