Abstract: Although a large literature has examined the effects of exposure to state symbols on political attitudes, voting behavior, and in/outgroup bias, there has been little work examining symbols’ effects on nationalist attitudes themselves, with existing studies offering contradictory findings. Leveraging conceptual insights from scholarship on nationalism and ethnic politics, I employ original data from a survey experiment conducted in the US in November 2020 to ask how exposure to state symbols influences individuals’ attitudes towards the nation relative to other identity categories. I find evidence that exposure to the US flag makes individuals significantly more likely to express pride in being American whilst simultaneously dampening attachment to other identity categories. At the same time, an almost identical effect is found when respondents are asked to reflect upon the meaning of the symbol.
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