Political Polarization

White nationalism has become increasingly visible in American public life. Yet we lack knowledge of the predictors and prevalence of explicit support for this ideology, as survey research has treated it as a latent construct captured through indirect indicators. We introduce and validate a measure that informs respondents of the core tenets of the white nationalist movement and then asks whether they support the movement. Expressed support is distinct from organizational affiliation with the movement, which we do not measure. Here we show with three national surveys of non-Hispanic white adults (conducted from 2021 to 2025) that support for white nationalism is (1) higher among white people encountering personal hardship and local social distress, consistent with strain theories3,16; (2) unrelated to local racial composition or recent demographic change, complicating status threat accounts4,17,18; and (3) elevated among white people with close friendships primarily online, consistent with theories of extremism driven by online mobilization7,10,19. Support for white nationalism is more common among white people with lower incomes and education, Republicans and conservatives, and those who are politically disaffected. In our national probability sample, prevalence of support was estimated at 4.9% of white adults, including 13.5% of white men aged 18–29. Support for white nationalism seems to constitute a discrete dimension of white racial attitudes, and many white people who endorse its core ideas are unaware of the label.

What political content do we pay attention to online? Diverse political information is essential for democratic competence, yet online media raises concerns about fragmented information diets. Research on selective exposure highlights how social media can foster ideological echo chambers, while other studies emphasize incidental exposure to diverse viewpoints. A critical limitation is measurement: existing research primarily uses engagement metrics (e.g., likes or shares), neglecting passive exposure or attention—what users notice but do not interact with. In this study, we address this gap through an experimental platform that separately records attention and engagement. Our findings indicate that the ideology-engagement association is about seven times the magnitude of the ideology-attention association. This underscores the importance of measuring attention, rather than solely engagement, to accurately assess the diversity of online information diets.