1 in 5 Americans May Be Estranged From Family Over Political Disagreement

These arguments can take a toll on mental and physical well-being, psychiatrists say. Is there a way to bridge the divide?

With the presidential election just weeks away, more Americans may find themselves involved in arguments with loved ones over controversial political issues.

A survey published October 3 by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) revealed that about 1 in 3 Americans (31 percent) expect to have a heated political discussion with their family members this election season.

The poll indicated that 1 in 5 adults (21 percent) have become estranged from a family member, have blocked a family member on social media (22 percent), or have skipped a family event (19 percent) because of disagreements on controversial topics. About 6 percent expect their family relations to get worse.

“When we’re seeing so many people having such a dramatic rupture with their loved ones, that’s a striking result,” says Petros Levounis, MD, the immediate past president of the APA and the chair of the psychiatry department at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School in Newark.

Mental Well-Being and Physical Health May Suffer

The poll, conducted among 2,201 adults between September 20 and 22 of this year, highlighted that more than 1 in 5 adults (22 percent) had discussions around controversial topics that made them anxious.

“If these conversations turn really ugly, we do find people becoming overly stressed and depressed because of the arguments,” says Dr. Levounis.

David Goodman, MD, an assistant professor in the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore, adds that intense verbal clashes can lead individuals to become isolated, which can further worsen mental well-being.

“You may obsess about the discussion or ruminate that you said something inappropriate, insulting, or ill-willed,” says Dr. Goodman, who was not involved in the survey. “When people obsess, that leads to a general sense of tension and anxiety.”

Additionally, this emotional turmoil can cause a loss of sleep, which along with stress, can aggravate physical health problems, such as high blood pressure, weight gain, and type 2 diabetes.

Social Media Could Be Adding Fuel to the Fire

Social media may be amplifying these disagreements.

“Social media creates political echo chambers that keep feeding you material that further confirms your political opinion, and before you know it, it has polarized the population to an extreme,” says Levounis.

Spending more time online may also fuel isolation and make it more difficult for people to have meaningful interactions.

“With social media, texting, and the pandemic, social verbal skills have really been curtailed, so people are more challenged when it comes to having difficult conversations,” says Goodman.

It’s Not All Bad News

While politics can certainly spur family turmoil, the survey did have several encouraging indications as well.

About 7 out of 10 respondents revealed that they expect their family will make it through the political turmoil and get along about the same as the holidays come around, while 12 percent anticipated their relationships would improve.

Two-thirds of Americans (67 percent) said their views on political matters were the same or compatible with those of close family members, and more than a quarter said they enjoyed engaging with differing opinions.

“A healthy political debate can be welcome from a mental health perspective,” says Levounis. He notes that people can feel more engaged, less isolated, and sharper cognitively as they form responses and questions to participate in a meaningful discussion.

How to Discuss Controversial Issues

Not everyone has the skills to talk about sensitive political subjects, but people can learn ways to engage that bring down the temperature and make these discussions more rewarding and less volatile.

Recommendations from the APA Council on Communications include:

Be ready to listen and consider whether you are ready to be open to someone else’s viewpoints.
Decide carefully when it’s time to engage. If someone says something you disagree with, take a few minutes to think about the outcome you’d want to reach by speaking up, and what you might want to say.
Consider the speaker’s personality traits and whether they are likely to engage helpfully with you.
Set some ground rules, such as agreeing to let the other person talk before you start to speak, or committing to a true willingness to learn from the other person.
When they’re done, reflect on these conversations, what you learned, and how they made you feel.

“If you do find yourself locking horns with a family member and there’s very little likelihood that anything positive is going to come out of that conversation, maybe walk away or choose a lighter topic,” says Levounis.

Goodman emphasizes that discussing political issues in a healthy manner is a skill that many people need to learn, and a mental health professional may be helpful in this area.

“How do I have a conversation about topics that might be controversial? How do I present my perspective? How do I listen to that other person’s perspective, and how do I control my emotional tone during the course of that conversation?” he says. “These are learned skills, and a therapist can teach people how to have better political discussions.”

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