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POLITICAL INVOLVEMENT AND SOCIAL REPRESENTATIONS OF DEMOCRACY IN ARGENTINA

ABSTRACT

The main objective of this work was to describe the social representations (SRs) of democracy as a function of political involvement. SRs play a role in shaping attitudes and behaviors and can help us to understand the political disaffection of citizens (Dahlberg, Linde, & Holberg, 2013). We took a sample quoted by sex, age and socioeconomic status of 454 Cordoba’s (AR) citizens. The word association technique was applied to access SRs of democracy and a questionnaire to evaluate political involvement. The results showed RS centered on restricted, electoral and liberal views of democracy. In addition, the perception of its actual functioning was mainly negative. The politically involved groups generated more sophisticated SRs and assign greater protagonism to citizenship than noninvolved ones.

Keywords:
Social Representations; Democracy; Political Sophistication; Political Participation

Associação Brasileira de Psicologia Social Programa de Pós-graduação em Psicologia, Universidade Federal de Pernambuco, Centro de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas (CFCH), Av. da Arquitetura S/N - 7º Andar - Cidade Universitária, Recife - PE - CEP: 50740-550 - Belo Horizonte - MG - Brazil
E-mail: revistapsisoc@gmail.com