Being Mimicked Makes You a Prosocial Voter
Abstract
People’s voting behavior has a great impact on the political road that is taken in our countries. The current research shows that mimicry, the imitation of nonverbal behavior, unconsciously affects our political voting behavior. Earlier research has shown that mimicry enhances prosocial thoughts and behaviors. As prosocial people are expected to be more attracted to left-wing parties, it was predicted that mimicry affects people’s voting behavior. As expected, mimickees voted more often for left-wing than for right-wing parties than nonmimickees. This effect was due to a shift in mimickees’ view of themselves as being more related to others. Thus, mimicry does more than making people more prosocial, it even affects their political decisions.
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