Why Trump? he is the ultimate salesman, and the ultimate superman with a super will

Donald Trump’s presidential election victory earlier this month stunned much of the media and political science community. But how could he have won despite his chances being written off by so many? To explore the answer to this question, David P. Redlawsk takes us back in time to the Iowa Caucus of August last year, and describes a rally which began to open his eyes to why Trump has had such an appeal to so many voters

New polls show that Bridgegate has washed away almost all of Chris Christie’s post-Sandy political capital

With New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s ‘Bridgegate’ scandal now in its third week, Ashley Koning and David Redlawsk take a close look at how Christie’s state and national poll numbers have been affected. Using the latest data from the Rutgers-Eagleton Poll, they argue that although Christie’s approval rating stands at 53 percent, this needs to be seen in the context of his previously very high ratings in the wake of Superstorm Sandy in late 2012. They write that Christie’s bipartisan appeal has taken a serious hit, as reflected by his far less favorable impression among Democrats, and that his trustworthiness is now at an all-time low

Chris Christie’s post Hurricane Sandy transformation from bully to bipartisan hero has all but guaranteed a landslide reelection and a potential 2016 presidential run

As voters head to the polls in today’s gubernatorial election in New Jersey, the current Governor, Republican Chris Christie, holds a near 30-point lead over his Democratic rival, State Senator Barbara Buono. Ashley Koning and David Redlawsk look at how his reaction to 2012’s Hurricane Sandy has enabled Christie to stage a dramatic comeback after a first term mainly fraught with polarization and growing public disenchantment. They write that Christie’s leadership in a time of crisis, as well as his much greater campaign support, have all but assured that he will retain the Governorship, and may even pave the way for a presidential bid in 2016

The Effect of Biased Communications On Both Trusting and Suspicious Voters

In recent studies of political decision-making, apparently anomalous behavior has been observed on the part of voters, in which negative information about a candidate strengthens, rather than weakens, a prior positive opinion about the candidate. This behavior appears to run counter to rational models of decision making, and it is sometimes interpreted as evidence of non-rational "motivated reasoning". We consider scenarios in which this effect arises in a model of rational decision making which includes the possibility of deceptive information. In particular, we will consider a model in which there are two classes of voters, which we will call trusting voters and suspicious voters, and two types of information sources, which we will call unbiased sources and biased sources. In our model, new data about a candidate can be efficiently incorporated by a trusting voter, and anomalous updates are impossible; however, anomalous updates can be made by suspicious voters, if the information source mistakenly plans for an audience of trusting voters, and if the partisan goals of the information source are known by the suspicious voter to be "opposite" to his own. Our model is based on a formalism introduced by the artificial intelligence community called "multi-agent influence diagrams", which generalize Bayesian networks to settings involving multiple agents with distinct goals

Bridgegate puts Chris Christie’s political future in troubled water by shifting perceptions of him from the “bully on your side” to just a plain bully

At the start of last week, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was seen by many as the Republican Party’s likely candidate for the 2016 Presidential election. Now, with the unfolding of the ‘Bridgegate’ scandal any hopes he may have had for 2016 may be in tatters. David Redlawsk and Ashley Koning take a look at why the scandal matters for Christie. They write that it vastly undermines both his carefully crafted bipartisan image, and confirms what many have already said – that he is a political bully whose office has a culture or retaliation

Black candidates who create positive feelings among voters can overcome implicit racist attitudes

With more explicit forms of racism having declined in recent decades, the implicit racial attitudes of how people feel about policies designed to help minorities, or ‘symbolic racism’, has begun to gain attention. But how do these forms of more implicit racism affect how minority political candidates are evaluated by voters? Using national election surveys carried out in 2012, David Redlawsk, Caroline Tolbert and Natasha Altema McNeely find that both positive and negative emotional responses to candidates running for office can help to condition the influence of underlying levels of racial resentment in shaping how voters evaluate them. More negative emotions, such as fear, make levels of symbolic racism worse, while more positive ones, such as hope, can help to overcome the effects of such racism

Challenging people's political views and values makes them think even harder and produce better arguments to defend themselves

To many, American politics and society seem more polarized than they have ever been. Why, then do people cling so tightly to their values, identities and attitudes? In new research, Cengiz Erisen, David P. Redlawsk, and Elif Erisen looked at the effects of presenting people with information that conflicted or refuted their own ideologies. They found that far from convincing ..

How negative ads from diverse right-wing media makes conservative voters dislike Democratic candidates even more

Recent years have seen growing hostility between those who support different political parties in America. But what is the media’s role in creating this increasing dislike? In new research, Richard Lau, David Andersen, Tessa Ditonto, Mona Kleinberg and David Redlawsk investigate this “affective polarization” by exposing participants to different news sources and positive and negative political advertising. They find that hostility towards the opposite party is at its highest when conservative subjects are exposed to negative ads and can customize their news environment

The Effects of Politician’s Moral Violations on Voters' Moral Emotions

Existing empirical research on voters’ responses to individual politicians’ moral transgressions pays limited attention to moral emotions, although moral emotions are an integral part of voters’ moral judgment. This study looks at U.S. voters’ discrete moral emotional responses to politician’s moral violations and examines how these discrete moral emotional responses are dependent on voters’ own moral principles and the extent to which they identify with a political party. We report on a 5 × 3 between-subjects experiment where 2026 U.S. respondents reacted to politicians’ violations of one of five moral foundations defined by Moral Foundations Theory. We randomly vary which moral foundation is violated and the partisanship of the politician. While voters’ own moral principles somewhat condition moral emotional responses, we find that voters’ moral emotional responses mostly depend on partisan identification. When voters share party identity with a politician committing a moral violation, they respond with less anger, contempt, disgust and shame than when they do not share party identity. The effect is greater among strong partisans. However, we find limited evidence that specific moral emotions are activated by violations of particular moral foundations, thereby challenging Moral Foundations Theory