Political Ideology Scale

What it measures

A 3-item self-report measure of political ideology along a liberal–conservative continuum. Higher scores reflect a more conservative political identity; lower scores reflect a more liberal political identity. Draws on items from Farwell & Weiner (2000), Graham, Haidt, & Nosek (2009), and Reyna et al. (2005). Item wording is fully reported in Northey et al. (2020), which constitutes the first published study to present all three items in the main text.

Response format

7-point scale; higher scores indicate more conservative orientation

Scale items

• Please indicate the political label with which you most identify (1 = extremely liberal, 7 = extremely conservative)
• I think of myself as a… (1 = strong Democrat, 7 = strong Republican)
• Politically, I would describe myself as (1 = extremely liberal, 7 = extremely conservative)

Full scale items shown. Always cite the original source when using this scale in research.

Usage notes & scoring

Item wording is drawn from Kaikati et al. (2017) as cited in Northey, G., Dolan, R., Etheridge, J., Septianto, F., & van Esch, P. (2020). LGBTQ imagery in advertising: How viewers' political ideology shapes their emotional response to gender and sexuality in advertisements. Journal of Advertising Research, 60(2), 222–236. α = .94 reported in both Kaikati et al. (2017, Study 2) and Northey et al. (2020). The Kaikati et al. methodological appendix (not reproduced in the main article) is the original source; Northey et al. (2020) is the first study to report all items in the published main text.

Recommended companion scales

Citation

Kaikati, A. M., Torelli, C. J., Winterich, K. P., & Rodas, M. A. (2017). Conforming conservatives: How salient social identities can increase donations. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 27(4), 422–434.

Keywords