When political talk translates into political action: The role of personality traits

Discussing politics in everyday life is quite common but it is not clear how talking politics should prompt the desire to become politically active. We compared two ideas: Information gain, i.e., political talk translates into action when people receive information about activities and organizations; and social influence, i.e., political talk translates into action when people perceive their friends as politically active. Our main goal was to address the role played by two personality traits – Openness to Experience and Agreeableness – within these processes. Adopting a longitudinal design (N = 895, sample of youths surveyed twice), we found that political talk promotes political participation over time when people perceive their discussion partners as politically active and that this effect is especially pronounced for agreeable people. Findings from this study provided support to the idea that political talk translates into political action under the condition of social influence and for people who are particularly susceptible to social conformity.