It isn't viewed as negative or positive (from a broad social desirability perspective), so not necessarily more negative - but I don't test for that specifically and it's something to think about. But, people do get that if they express less cynicism, they'll end up looking politically uninformed.

If this sounds cool to you, I’ll be presenting my next project on political cynicism and our perceptions of others on the “Innovations in Political Communication Research” on Friday at 1:15 #MPSA2024

I find that, while people don’t view political cynicism as “good” socially, they understand it can be used to look knowledgeable about politics. Specifically, they understand that they can use political cynicism to avoid looking like they DON’T know about politics.