Recent research has begun to explore the use of visual appeals by politicians as a distinct form of political communication. However, the effects of these appeals on voters’ perceptions of male and female politicians’ regarding warmth, competence, and overall candidate viability remain underexplored. We have little knowledge on whether images of male and female MPs presented in private versus professional contexts on social media shape voters' perceptions of their warmth and competence differently. Furthermore, we know little about how visuals interact with issue based appeals in shaping those attitudes. We argue that men politicians can increase voters' ratings of their competence by appealing to stereotypically masculine issues (e.g. public finance) in a professionalized visual setting. Based on role incongruity theory, we expect women politicians to profit most from combining issue appeals to stereotypically masculine issue areas with a more personalized visual communication strategy. To increase external validity, we first test our hypotheses using a survey experiment in which we confront participants with images of actual politicians in personalized versus professionalized settings in combination with appeals to stereotypically feminine or masculine policy areas, before assessing their ratings of the candidates' warmth and competence, as well as their overall viability. Second, we post the images on various social media platforms (e.g. Instagram, Facebook) and measure various engagement metrics (e.g. Views, Likes, Comments) of users. By combining survey research with an online observational study, we evaluate the ways in which female MPs must present themselves in order to be perceived as viable candidates.
