The Era of Bad Feelings

Since the early 1950s, the Gallup Poll has asked people to rate various public figures on a scale of +5 to -5.  During most Presidential elections (all except 1988, 1996, and 2000) since 1952, it has asked about the major party candidates (plus George Wallace in 1968, John Anderson in 1980, and Ross Perot in 1992).  I wrote about the balance of positive and negative ratings in a previous post, and mentioned that there was also a shift in extreme ratings.  Here I look at that shift in more detail.  The percent giving the major party candidates the highest possible rating:

Basically a downward trend--looking more closely, it seems that the trend was stronger earlier on and has leveled off since about 1980. 

Next, the percent giving the lowest possible rating:

The most striking thing here is the big jump in 2016, when both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump had more -5 ratings than any previous major-party candidate.  But it seems that there was some upward trend before that time. 

Finally, I plot -5 against +5 ratings, distinguishing between three "eras"--1952-68, 1972-92, and 2004-16.  I include George Wallace and Ross Perot in this one (I forgot to record the data for Anderson, but he stood out by not having many strong reactions either way--5% plus 5 and 13% minus 5. 

In the first period, there was a lot of variation in +5 ratings, but only Goldwater and Wallace had large numbers of -5 ratings.  In the second period, there were fewer +5 ratings and somewhat more -5.  The third period is marked by large numbers of -5 ratings for everyone.  Some (Trump and Clinton) do worse than others, but no one does well by historical standards.  In 2004, 20% rated John Kerry at -5, breaking the previous record for a Democratic candidate (16% for McGovern in 1972).  In 2008 and 2018, Obama improved on Kerry in +5 ratings, but was almost the same in -5 (18% in 2008, 20% in 2012). . The omission of 1996 and 2000 makes it hard to identify exactly when the upward movement in negative feelings began, but in the ANES "feeling thermometer" for parties, the rise in very low ratings didn't seem to start until after 2000.  


[Data from the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research]