Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-8ctnn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T09:57:42.510Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Does Social Disagreement Attenuate Partisan Motivated Reasoning? A Test Case Concerning Economic Evaluations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 October 2018

Joshua Robison
Joshua Robison*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Aarhus University, Aarhus
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Research on partisan motivated reasoning shows that citizens perceive the world differently based upon their partisan allegiances. Here we marshal evidence from several national surveys to investigate whether partisan motivated reasoning is attenuated among partisans situated within disagreeable political discussion networks. While our analyses suggest that exposure to interpersonal disagreement is associated with weaker partisan identities, we find limited evidence that disagreement attenuates partisan differences in knowledge or retrospective evaluations of the economy. This suggests that interpersonal disagreement is unlikely to help reduce partisan motivated reasoning. Our results thus speak to important debates concerning the influence of social discussion on political attitudes, the nature of partisan motivated reasoning and the ability of citizens to hold elites accountable.

Keywords

motivated reasoningeconomic evaluationspolitical knowledgepolitical discussion
Type
Articles
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 50 , Issue 4 , October 2020 , pp. 1245 - 1261
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2018

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ahler, D and Sood, G (2018) The parties in our heads: misperceptions about party composition and their consequences. Journal of Politics 80 (3): 981.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barabas, J (2004) How deliberation affects policy opinions. American Political Science Review 98 (4): 687–701.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bartels, LM (2008) Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Bisgaard, M (2015) Bias will find a way: economic perceptions, attributions of blame, and partisan-motivated reasoning during crisis. Journal of Politics 77 (3): 849–860.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bloom, PBN and Levitan, LC (2011) We’re closer than I thought: social network heterogeneity, morality, and political persuasion. Political Psychology 32 (4): 643–665.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bolsen, T, Druckman, JN and Cook, FL (2014) The influence of partisan motivated reasoning on public opinion. Political Behavior 36 (2): 235–262.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brender, A and Drazen, A (2008) How do budget deficits and economic growth affect reelection prospects? Evidence from a large panel of countries. The American Economic Review 98 (5): 2203–2220.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bullock, J, Gerber, AS, Hill, SJ and Huber, SA (2015) Partisan bias in factual beliefs about politics. Quarterly Journal of Political Science 10, 519–578.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buttice, M, Huckfeldt, R and Ryan, JB (2009) Polarization, attribution, and communication networks in the 2006 congressional elections. In Mondak J and Mitchell DG, (eds) Fault Lines: Why the Republicans Lost Congress. New York: Routledge, pp. 42–60.Google Scholar
Campbell, A, Converse, PE, Miller, WE and Stokes, DE (1960) The American Voter. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Chaiken, S, Giner-Sorolla, R and Chen, S (1996) Beyond accuracy: defense and impression motives in heuristic and systematic processing. In Gollwitzer PM and Bargh JA, (eds) The Psychology of Action: Linking Motivation and Cognition in Behavior. New York: Guilford Press, pp. 553–578.Google Scholar
Conover, PJ, Feldman, S and Knight, K (1986) Judging inflation and unemployment: the origins of retrospective evaluations. Journal of Politics 48, 565–588.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Druckman, JN (2014) Pathologies of studying public opinion, political communication, and democratic responsiveness. Political Communication 31 (3): 467–492.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Druckman, JN, Fein, J and Leeper, TJ (2012) A source of bias in public opinion stability. American Political Science Review 106 (2): 430–454.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Druckman, JN, Levendusky, MS and McLain, A (2018) No need to watch: how the effects of partisan media can spread via inter-personal discussions. American Journal of Political Science 62 (1): 99–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Druckman, JN, Peterson, E and Slothuus, R (2013) How elite partisan polarization affects public opinion formation. American Political Science Review 107 (1): 57–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duch, RM and Stevenson, R (2008) The Economic Vote: How Political and Economic Institutions Condition Electoral Results. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duch, RM, Palmer, HD and Anderson, CJ (2000) Heterogeneity in perceptions of national economic conditions. American Journal of Political Science 44 (4): 635–652.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Enns, PK and McAvoy, GE (2012) The role of partisanship in aggregate opinion. Political Behavior 34 (4): 627–651.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Enns, PK, Kellstedt, PM and McAvoy, GE (2012) The consequences of partisanship in economic perceptions. Public Opinion Quarterly 76 (2): 287–310.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Evans, G and Andersen, R (2006) The political conditioning of economic perceptions. Journal of Politics 68 (1): 194–207.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Evans, G and Pickup, M (2010) Reversing the causal arrow: the political conditioning of economic perceptions in the 2000–2004 presidential election cycle. Journal of Politics 72 (4): 1236–1251.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fiorina, MP (1981) Retrospective Voting in American National Elections. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Gaines, BJ, Kuklinski, JH, Quick, PJ, Peyton, B and Verkuilen, J (2007) Same facts, different interpretations: partisan motivation and opinion on Iraq. Journal of Politics 69 (4): 957–974.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gerber, A and Green, D (1999) Misperceptions about perceptual bias. Annual Review of Political Science 2, 189–210.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haller, HB and Norporth, H (1997) Reality bites: news exposure and economic opinion. Public Opinion Quarterly 61, 555–575.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Healy, A and Malhotra, N (2013) Retrospective voting reconsidered. Annual Review of Political Science 16, 285–306.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hellwig, T and Marinova, DM (2015) More misinformed than myopic: economic retrospections and the voter's time horizon. Political Behavior 37, 865–887.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hetherington, MJ (1996) The media’s role in forming voters’ national economic evaluations in 1992. American Journal of Political Science 40 (2): 372–395.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Huckfeldt, R (2001) The social communication of political expertise. American Journal of Political Science 45 (2): 425–438.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Huckfeldt, R, Mendez, JM and Osborn, T (2004) Disagreement, ambivalence, and engagement: the political consequences of heterogenous networks. Political Psychology 25 (1): 65–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Huckfeldt, R and Sprague, J (1995) Citizens, Politics, and Social Communication. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Huddy, L, Mason, L and Aarøe, L (2015) Expressive partisanship: campaign involvement, political emotion, and partisan identity. American Political Science Review 109 (1): 1–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Isenberg, DJ (1986) Group polarization: a critical review and meta-analysis. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 50 (6): 1141–1151.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Iyengar, S and Hahn, KS (2009) Red media, blue media: evidence of ideological selectivity in media use. Journal of Communication 59 (1): 19–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jerit, J and Barabas, J (2012) Partisan perceptual bias and the information environment. Journal of Politics 74 (3): 672–684.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klar, S (2014) Partisanship in a social context. American Journal of Political Science 58 (3): 687–704.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klofstad, CA (2010) The lasting effect of civic talk on civic participation: evidence from a panel study. Social Forces 88 (5): 2353–2375.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klofstad, CA, McClurg, SD and Rolfe, M (2009) Measurement of political discussion networks: a comparison of two ‘Name Generator’ procedures. Public Opinion Quarterly 73 (3): 462–483.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klofstad, CA, Sokhey, AE and McClurg, SD (2013) Disagreeing about disagreement: how conflict in social networks affects political behavior. American Journal of Political Science 57 (1): 120–134.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kunda, Z (1990) The case for motivated reasoning. Psychological Bulletin 108 (3): 480–498.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Larcinese, V, Puglisi, R and Snyder, JM Jr (2011) Partisan bias in economic news: evidence of the agenda-setting behavior of U.S. newspapers. Journal of Public Economics 95, 1178–1189.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lavine, HG, Johnston, CD and Steenbergen, MR (2012) The Ambivalent Partisan: How Critical Loyalty Promotes Democracy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lebo, MJ and Cassino, D (2007) The aggregated consequences of motivated reasoning and the dynamics of partisan presidential approval. Political Psychology 28 (6): 719–746.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leeper, TJ and Slothuus, R (2014) Political parties, motivated reasoning, and public opinion formation. Advances in Political Psychology 35 (1): 129–156.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Levendusky, MS, Druckman, JN and McLain, A (2016) How group discussions create strong attitudes and strong partisans. Research and Politics 1–6.Google Scholar
Lodge, M and Taber, CS (2006) Motivated skepticism in the evaluation of political beliefs. American Journal of Political Science 50 (3): 755–769.Google Scholar
Lord, CG, Ross, L and Lepper, MR (1979) Biased assimilation and attitude polarization: the effects of prior theories on subsequently considered evidence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 27 (11): 2098–2109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lupia, A (2002) Who can persuade whom? Implications from the nexus of psychology and rational choice theory. In Kuklinski JH, (ed.) Thinking about Political Psychology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 51–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lupton, RN, Singh, SP and Thornton, JR (2015) The moderating impact of social networks on the relationships among core values, partisanship, and candidate evaluations. Political Psychology 36 (4): 399–414.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lupton, RN and Thornton, J (2017) Disagreement, diversity, and participation: examining the properties of several measures of political discussion networks. Political Behavior 39 (3): 585–608.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lupu, N (2015) Party polarization and mass partisanship: a comparative perspective. Political Behavior 37, 331–356.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lyons, J and Sokhey, AE (2017) Discussion networks, issues, and perceptions of polarization in the American electorate. Political Behavior 39 (4): 967–988.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mendelberg, T (2002) The deliberative citizen: theory and evidence. In Carpini MXD and Shapiro RY, (eds) Research in Micropolitics: Political Decision Making, Deliberation, and Participation. Bingley: Emerald Group Publishing, pp. 151–193.Google Scholar
Mullinix, KJ (2016) Partisanship and preference formation: competing motivations, elite polarization, and issue importance. Political Behavior 38 (2): 383–411.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mutz, DC (2006) Hearing the Other Side: Deliberative versus Participatory Democracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mutz, DC (2002a) Cross-cutting social networks: testing democratic theory in practice. American Political Science Review 96 (1): 111–126.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mutz, D (2002b) The consequences of cross-cutting networks for political participation. American Journal of Political Science 46 (4): 838–855.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mutz, DC and Mondak, JJ (2006) The workplace as a context for cross-cutting political discourse. Journal of Politics 68 (1): 140–155.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nir, L (2005) Ambivalent social networks and their consequences for participation. International Journal of Public Opinion Research 17 (4): 422–442.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nir, L (2011a) Disagreement and opposition in social networks: does disagreement discourage turnout? Political Studies 59 (3): 674–692.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nir, L (2011b) Motivated reasoning and public opinion perception. Public Opinion Quarterly 75 (3): 504–532.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pattie, C and Johnston, R (2008) It’s good to talk: talk, disagreement, and tolerance. British Journal of Political Science 38, 677–698.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Price, V, Cappella, JN and Nir, L (2002) Does disagreement contribute to more deliberative opinion? Political Communication 19, 95–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Prior, M, Sood, G and Khanna, K (2015) You cannot be serious: the impact of accuracy incentives on partisan bias in reports of economic perceptions. Quarterly Journal of Political Science 10, 489–518.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ramirez, MD and Erickson, N (2014) Partisan bias and information discounting in economic judgments. Political Psychology 35 (3): 401–415.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Redlawsk, DP, Civettini, AJW and Emmerson, KM (2010) The affective tipping point: do motivated reasoners ever ‘get it’? Political Psychology 31 (4): 563–593.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robison, Joshua (2018) “Replication Data for: Does Social Disagreement Attenuate Partisan Motivated Reasoning? A Test Case Concerning Economic Evaluations”, https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/CHBAYB, Harvard Dataverse, V1.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robison, J, Leeper, TJ and Druckman, JN (2018) Do Disagreeable political discussion networks undermine attitude strength? Political Psychology 39 (2): 479–494.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robison, J and Mullinix, K (2016) Elite polarization and public opinion: how polarization is communicated and its effects. Political Communication 33 (2): 261–282.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sinclair, B (2012) The Social Citizen: Peer Networks in Political Behavior. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sokhey, AE and McClurg, SD (2012) Social networks and correct voting. Journal of Politics 74 (3): 751–764.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Soroka, SN (2006) Good news and bad news: asymmetric responses to economic information. Journal of Politics 68 (2): 372–385.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stanig, P (2013) Political polarization in retrospective economic evaluations during recessions and recoveries. Electoral Studies 32, 729–745.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stroud, NJ (2011) Niche News: The Politics of News Choice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tilley, J and Hobolt, SB (2011) Is the government to blame? An experimental test of how partisanship shapes perceptions of performance and responsibility. Journal of Politics 73 (2): 316–330.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Visser, PS and Mirabile, RR (2004) Attitudes in the social context: the impact of social network composition on individual-level attitude strength. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 87 (6): 779–795.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wojcieszak, ME (2012) On strong attitudes and group deliberation: relationships, structure, changes, and effects. Political Psychology 33 (2): 225–242.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wojcieszak, ME and Mutz, DC (2009) Online groups and political discourse: do online discussion spaces facilitate exposure to political disagreement? Journal of Communication 59, 40–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: Link

Robison Dataset

Dataset

https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/CHBAYB
Link
Supplementary material: PDF

Robison supplementary material

Robison supplementary material 1

Download Robison supplementary material(PDF)
PDF 79.3 KB