Who goes with whom: The multidimensional cognitive map of U.S. political coalitions

Polarization debates often presume two sorted “camps” in American politics, yet we lack a map of how citizens perceive the coalitions that constitute these camps—perceptions that structure partisan animus, information processing and vote choice, and political behavior. Across five studies using historical and novel survey data, we inductively discover this cognitive map. Analyses reveal a stable, asymmetric, tripartite structure: a unified conservative coalition alongside a fractured liberal wing composed of distinct “Ideological” and “Demographic” coalitions. This structure is organized along two dimensions: a primary ideological axis capturing left–right conflict, and a secondary common fate axis distinguishing groups perceived as motivated by tangible, widespread welfare concerns versus narrower “special” interests. Critically, tangible-priority perceptions predict partisan hostility towards groups, beyond groups’ perceived ideological and partisan extremity. This perceptual architecture explains the entanglement of social-group stereotypes with partisanship, reconciles rising affective polarization with stable demographic sorting, and identifies limits on persuasion and mobilization.