Order Effects of Ballot Position without Information-Induced Confirmatory Bias

Candidate list positions have been shown to influence decision making when voters have limited candidate information (e.g. Miller and Krosnick, 1998; Brockington, 2003). Here, a primacy advantage is observed due to a greater number of positive arguments generated for early list candidates (Krosnick, 1991). The present study examined list position effects when an absence of information precludes such a confirmatory bias heuristic. We report the first large scale low-information experimental election where candidate position is fully counterbalanced. Seven hundred and twenty participants voted in a mock election where the position of 6 fictitious and meaningless parties was counterbalanced across the electorate. Analysis by position revealed that significantly fewer votes were allocated to the terminal parties (Experiment 1). In addition, Experiment 1 reported preliminary evidence of an alphabetical bias (consistent with Bagley, 1966). However, this positional bias was not present in a methodological replication using six genuine UK political parties (Experiment 2). This suggests that in situations of pure guessing, the heuristic shifts from the primacy benefiting confirmatory bias to an alternative heuristic that prejudices the first and last parties. These findings suggest that whilst the UK general electoral process may be largely immune to positional prejudice, English local elections (in which there can be multiple candidates from the same party) and multiple preference ranking systems (Scottish Local Government and London Mayoral Elections) could be susceptible to both positional and alphabetical biases

Fight and flight: Evidence of aggressive capitulation in the face of fear messages from terrorists

In an era of digital technology and the Internet, terrorists can communicate their threats directly to citizens of Western countries. Yet no research has examined whether these messages change individuals’ attitudes and behaviour, or the psychological processes underlying these effects. Two studies (conducted in 2008 and 2010) examined how American, Australian, and British participants responded to messages from Osama bin Laden that threatened violence if troops were not withdrawn from Afghanistan. Heightened fear in response to the message resulted in what we call “aggressive capitulation,” characterized by two different group-protection responses: (1) submission to terrorist demands in the face of threats made against one’s country, and (2) support for increased efforts to combat the source of the threat, but expressed in abstract terms that do not leave one’s country vulnerable. Fear predicted influence over and above other variables relevant to persuasion. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed

First Is Best

We experience the world serially rather than simultaneously. A century of research on human and nonhuman animals has suggested that the first experience in a series of two or more is cognitively privileged. We report three experiments designed to test the effect of first position on implicit preference and choice using targets that range from individual humans and social groups to consumer goods. Experiment 1 demonstrated an implicit preference to buy goods from the first salesperson encountered and to join teams encountered first, even when the difference in encounter is mere seconds. In Experiment 2 the first of two consumer items presented in quick succession was more likely to be chosen. In Experiment 3 an alternative hypothesis that first position merely accentuates the valence of options was ruled out by demonstrating that first position enhances preference for the first even when it is evaluatively negative in meaning (a criminal). Together, these experiments demonstrate a “first is best” effect and we offer possible interpretations based on evolutionary mechanisms of this “bound” on rational behavior and suggest that automaticity of judgment may be a helpful principle in clarifying previous inconsistencies in the empirical record on the effects of order on preference and choice

Readability estimates for commonly used health-related quality of life surveys

To estimate readability of seven commonly used health-related quality of life instruments: SF-36, HUI, EQ-5D, QWB-SA, HALex, Minnesota Living with Heart Failure Questionnaire (MLHFQ), and the NEI-VFQ-25. The Flesch–Kincaid (F–K) and Flesch Reading Ease (FRE) formulae were used to estimate readability for every item in each measure. The percentage of items that require more than 5 years of formal schooling according to F–K was 50 for the EQ-5D, 53 for the SF-36, 80 for the VFQ-25, 85 for the QWB-SA, 100 for the HUI, HALex, and the MLHFQ. The percentage of items deemed harder than “easy” according to FRE was 50 for the SF-36, 67 for the EQ-5D, 79 for the QWB-SA, 80 for the VFQ-25, 100 for the HUI, HALex, and the MLHFQ. All seven surveys have a substantial number of items with high readability levels that may not be appropriate for the general population

The Nature and Origins of Misperceptions: Understanding False and Unsupported Beliefs About Politics

PublishedThis is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Wiley via the DOI in this record.Political misperceptions can distort public debate and undermine people's ability to form meaningful opinions. Why do people often hold these false or unsupported beliefs, and why is it sometimes so difficult to convince them otherwise? We argue that political misperceptions are typically rooted in directionally motivated reasoning, which limits the effectiveness of corrective information about controversial issues and political figures. We discuss factors known to affect the prevalence of directionally motivated reasoning and assess strategies for accurately measuring misperceptions in surveys. Finally, we address the normative implications of misperceptions for democracy and suggest important topics for future research.This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (Grant Agreement No. 682758). We thank Adam Berinsky, Daniel Diermeier, Jamie Druckman, Howie Lavine, Ben Page, Ethan Porter, Gaurav Sood, Joe Uscinski, attendees at the University of Michigan conference on How We Can Improve Health Science Communication, and especially the anonymous reviewers for useful suggestions and feedback. All remaining errors are, of course, our own. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Brendan Nyhan, Dartmouth College, Department of Government, 3 Tuck Mall, Hanover, NH 03755. E-mail: [email protected]