IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0339333.html

Political polarization on the move: Analyzing geographical mobility between counties in the U.S

Author

Listed:
  • Zhengyi Liang
  • Jaeho Cho

Abstract

Research on geographical polarization typically focuses on residential segregation by partisanship, where individuals with similar political affiliations cluster in the neighborhoods. Our study extends this line of research beyond residential spaces by investigating the influence of political leaning on geographical mobility in non-residential, activity spaces. Specifically, by analyzing human mobility patterns between counties, we explore the effects of political leaning and the strength of political leaning on the preference for politically similar locations. We find that while political leaning does not significantly impact mobility preferences, the strength of political leaning does, even after controlling for economic, demographic, and other contextual factors. Individuals traveling from counties with a strong political leaning are more likely to visit politically congruent destinations. This finding suggests that everyday travel may align with political preferences in counties with politically homogeneous populations. Our study highlights a new research avenue for research on geographical polarization by focusing on human mobility, providing unique insights into how political divisions influence spatial segregation.

Suggested Citation

  • Zhengyi Liang & Jaeho Cho, 2026. "Political polarization on the move: Analyzing geographical mobility between counties in the U.S," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 21(1), pages 1-14, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0339333
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0339333
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0339333
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0339333&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0339333?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. repec:nas:journl:v:115:y:2018:p:7735-7740 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Jacob R. Brown & Ryan D. Enos, 2021. "The measurement of partisan sorting for 180 million voters," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 5(8), pages 998-1008, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. repec:osf:socarx:qhs6j_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Gordon B. Dahl & Runjing Lu & William Mullins, 2022. "Partisan Fertility and Presidential Elections," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 4(4), pages 473-490, December.
    3. Toshkov, Dimiter & Brummel, Lars & Carroll, Brendan & Yesilkagit, Kutsal, 2024. "Public Policy Attitudes and Political Polarization in the Netherlands," OSF Preprints bz6n9, Center for Open Science.
    4. Keith Ihlanfeldt & Cynthia Fan Yang, 2024. "Political and racial neighborhood sorting: How is it changing?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 198(1), pages 161-187, January.
    5. Carozzi, Felipe & Cipullo, Davide & Repetto, Luca, 2024. "Powers that be? Political alignment, government formation, and government stability," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 230(C).
    6. Tal Alster & Harel Nachmany & Nufar Avni, 2025. "Residents’ expectations from the municipality in an age of urban-national polarisation," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 62(12), pages 2491-2507, September.
    7. Johannes Matzat & Axel Dreher & Sarah Langlotz & Christopher Parsons, 2026. "From Moderates to Extremes: How Immigration Polarizes American Politics," CESifo Working Paper Series 12377, CESifo.
    8. James N. Druckman & Donald P. Green & Shanto Iyengar, 2023. "Does Affective Polarization Contribute to Democratic Backsliding in America?," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 708(1), pages 137-163, July.
    9. Mira Frick & Ryota Iijima & Yuhta Ishii, 2018. "Dispersed Behavior and Perceptions in Assortative Societies," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 2128, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    10. Clay Collins, 2026. "Emotional Cues, Election Outcomes, and Intimate Partner Violence," Eastern Economic Journal, Palgrave Macmillan;Eastern Economic Association, vol. 52(1), pages 107-135, January.
    11. W. Ben Mccartney & John Orellana‐Li & Calvin Zhang, 2024. "Political Polarization Affects Households' Financial Decisions: Evidence from Home Sales," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 79(2), pages 795-841, April.
    12. Mira Frick & Ryota Iijima & Yuhta Ishii, 2018. "Dispersed Behavior and Perceptions in Assortative Societies," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 2128R3, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University, revised Jun 2022.
    13. Fehder, Daniel & Teodoridis, Florenta & Raffiee, Joseph & Lu, Jino, 2024. "The partisanship of American inventors," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(7).
    14. Andres Karjus & Christine Cuskley, 2024. "Evolving linguistic divergence on polarizing social media," Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 11(1), pages 1-14, December.
    15. James Flamino & Alessandro Galeazzi & Stuart Feldman & Michael W. Macy & Brendan Cross & Zhenkun Zhou & Matteo Serafino & Alexandre Bovet & Hernán A. Makse & Boleslaw K. Szymanski, 2023. "Political polarization of news media and influencers on Twitter in the 2016 and 2020 US presidential elections," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 7(6), pages 904-916, June.
    16. Fang, Ximeng & Heuser, Sven & Stötzer, Lasse S., 2025. "How in-person conversations shape political polarization: Quasi-experimental evidence from a nationwide initiative," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 242(C).
    17. Falkenberg, Max & Cinelli, Matteo & Galeazzi, Alessandro & Bail, Christopher A. & Benito, Rosa & Bruns, Axel & Gruzd, Anatoliy & Lazer, David & Lee, Jae K. & McCoy, Jennifer, 2025. "Towards global equity in political polarization research," OSF Preprints 3wzfq_v1, Center for Open Science.
    18. Peter Lambert & Chris Larkin, 2024. "Has work from home shifted the US electoral map?," CEP Occasional Papers 67, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    19. Schmutz, Benoît & Verdugo, Gregory, 2023. "Do elections affect immigration? Evidence from French municipalities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 218(C).
    20. Matthew I. Jones & Antonio D. Sirianni & Feng Fu, 2022. "Polarization, abstention, and the median voter theorem," Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 9(1), pages 1-12, December.
    21. repec:osf:socarx:yjveb_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. David P. Baron, 2025. "Contemporary social federalism: Sorting, natural polarization, and policy devolvement," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 37(2), pages 89-121, April.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0339333. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.