When and How to Go Negative
By Mike Medeiros
There always seems to be an election campaign going on somewhere. Sweden and the German state of Sachsen-Anhalt both held highly publicized elections earlier this month. In Canada, campaigns are currently underway for the Quebec provincial election and municipal elections across Ontario. Brazil is also in the middle of its 2026 election campaign, while the United States is heading towards its November midterm elections. In the latter two cases, campaigns can get quite nasty.
Not all election campaigns are negative. But political attacks are a familiar feature of modern campaigning, and they can be some of the most memorable messages voters encounter.
But are they effective?
To answer that question, I spoke with Alessandro Nai, an Associate Professor of Political Communication and Journalism at the Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR) at the University of Amsterdam. Nai is an expert on negative communication and negative campaigning.
For communication professionals, negative communication can be tempting when criticizing a competitor, responding to an attack, or simply trying to attract attention. But when does going negative actually make sense, and what are the risks?
Does Going Negative Work?
There is a widespread belief that negative communication works. According to Nai, this belief is particularly entrenched among campaign consultants, who often see attacking an opponent as a necessary part of campaigning.
However, the reality is more complicated.
Negative messages can be effective at capturing attention, particularly when they are aggressive or provocative. They can also mobilize segments of the population that are already highly polarized or respond positively to aggressive messaging.
But attention is not the same thing as persuasion.
A negative message can hurt the target while also hurting the person delivering it. This is known as the backlash effect. While an attack may reduce support for an opponent, it can also reduce support for the attacker.
This makes it difficult to say that negative communication simply “works.” Its effectiveness depends on what we mean by success. Is the objective to attract attention, damage a competitor, mobilize existing supporters, change people’s minds, or generate media coverage?
A message that generates significant attention may look successful through media coverage, social media engagement, or impressions. But if that attention comes at the expense of the organisation’s reputation, the result may be less positive than the initial metrics suggest.
Not all publicity is necessarily good publicity!
When Should You Go Negative?
If negative communication can produce both benefits and costs, when should a communicator actually use it?
For Nai, the first consideration should be the image of the person or organisation delivering the message.
People do not evaluate a message in isolation. They evaluate it in relation to what they already believe about the communicator. An aggressive attack from someone known for being confrontational may therefore be received differently from the same attack coming from someone with a reputation for being positive and conciliatory.
This is related to what researchers call expectancy violation. We have expectations about how certain people are supposed to behave. When they behave differently, we notice it and may react negatively.
Nai points to gender as one example. Research suggests that women who engage in negative campaigning can sometimes face greater backlash because voters may hold stereotypes that women should behave in a kinder or more cooperative manner.
Similarly, a candidate with an aggressive public persona may be given more latitude when attacking an opponent because the behaviour is consistent with what voters already expect.
The same principle can apply outside politics.
Before going negative, communicators should therefore ask: Does this message fit our existing image?
If it does not, that does not necessarily mean the message should not be used. An organisation may deliberately want to change how it is perceived. But that choice comes with costs and needs to be made consciously.
The second question a communicator should ask is: What exactly are we trying to achieve?
A communicator might want to weaken a competitor, energize supporters, attract media attention, or change the public conversation. These are very different objectives.
Attacking a competitor may energize existing supporters, but it may also alienate people who are undecided or less committed.
Generating media attention may also be relatively easy through an aggressive message, but once journalists and commentators pick up the story, the organisation loses some control over the narrative.
Context matters too. There is a difference between initiating an attack and responding to one. According to Nai, audiences tend to be more forgiving when a communicator responds to an attack because a response is expected. But by responding, the communicator may also allow the opponent to determine the subject of the debate.
When Does Going Negative Go Too Far?
Perhaps the biggest danger is assuming that there is a universal formula for when negative communication becomes too negative.
Nai cautions against treating negative communication as inherently bad. Criticism can serve an important purpose. Negative campaigning can, for example, expose wrongdoing. More broadly, criticism allows organisations and individuals to challenge claims and hold competitors accountable.
The problem comes when negativity becomes an objective in itself.
Nai suggests that negative communication becomes particularly problematic when it is primarily an exercise in violating social norms or being aggressive simply for the sake of attracting attention.
The difficulty is that these norms are not universal. What one person considers impolite, another may consider perfectly acceptable. Those norms can also change over time.
Another important consideration is who receives the message.
Nai’s research suggests that people respond differently to negative and uncivil communication depending on their political alignment and individual characteristics. People who are closely aligned with the communicator are more likely to forgive attacks, even when they might otherwise find them distasteful.
Personality also matters. Individuals who are more aggressive or have a greater need for chaos are more likely to view attacks as acceptable or entertaining.
For communication professionals, this means there is no single audience response to a negative message. A message designed to energize one audience may alienate another.
That is particularly important in today’s fragmented media environment, where organisations communicate simultaneously with loyal supporters, critics, journalists, employees, and the general public.
Negative Communication Is a Strategic Choice
So, should communicators go negative?
There’s no one-size-fits-all answer. Negative communication can attract attention and serve a legitimate strategic purpose; but it can also produce backlash, damage the communicator’s image, and give others control over the conversation.
For communication professionals, going negative should therefore be a strategic choice, not simply a reaction to the pressure to be noticed.
Before going negative, communicators should consider the communicator, the audience, the objective, and the context. Does the message fit the organisation’s existing image? Is the goal to weaken a competitor, mobilize supporters, generate attention, or shape the public debate? Who will receive the message, and how might they interpret it? Is the organisation initiating the attack or responding to one?
There is also another question worth asking: What happens if the message works?
An attack that successfully attracts attention can take on a life of its own. Journalists may pick it up. Supporters may amplify it. Critics may respond. The organisation may then find itself defending the tone or substance of its own message rather than communicating the issue it originally wanted to discuss.
Negative communication can be rewarding. In some situations, it may even be expected. But the fact that an attack gets noticed does not necessarily mean that it has succeeded.
For communication professionals, the challenge therefore is not simply knowing when to go negative. It is knowing why they are doing it, who they are speaking to, and what they are willing to risk in the process.
Mike Medeiros is a political scientist and communications specialist with expertise in political psychology, public communication, and audience behaviour. He holds a PhD in Political Science and recently completed the Strategic Public Relations program at the University of Toronto.