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More accurate, but no less polarized: comparing the factual beliefs of government officials and the public

More accurate, but no less polarized: comparing the factual beliefs of government officials and the public
More accurate, but no less polarized: comparing the factual beliefs of government officials and the public
Studies of the American public demonstrate that partisans often diverge not only on questions of opinion but also on matters of fact. However, little is known about partisan divergence in factual beliefs among the government officials who make real policy decisions, or how it compares to belief polarization among the public. This letter describes the first systematic comparison of factual belief polarization between the public and government officials, which we conducted using a paired survey approach. The results indicate that political elites are consistently more accurately informed than the public across a wide range of politically contentious facts. However, this increase in accuracy does not translate into reduced factual belief polarization. These findings demonstrate that a more informed political elite does not necessarily mitigate partisan factual disagreement in policy making.
0007-1234
1315-1322
Lee, Nathan
cf2f0d00-27d5-42e2-8f36-56c1817fc092
Nyhan, Brendan
76e1ec80-0af5-432d-9dd6-f7e8237191e4
Reifler, Jason
426301a1-f90b-470d-a076-04a9d716c491
Flynn, DJ
a5ba1541-23a8-4a58-8e62-d7c2ed67d6d7
Lee, Nathan
cf2f0d00-27d5-42e2-8f36-56c1817fc092
Nyhan, Brendan
76e1ec80-0af5-432d-9dd6-f7e8237191e4
Reifler, Jason
426301a1-f90b-470d-a076-04a9d716c491
Flynn, DJ
a5ba1541-23a8-4a58-8e62-d7c2ed67d6d7

Lee, Nathan, Nyhan, Brendan, Reifler, Jason and Flynn, DJ (2021) More accurate, but no less polarized: comparing the factual beliefs of government officials and the public. British Journal of Political Science, 51 (3), 1315-1322. (doi:10.1017/S000712342000037X).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Studies of the American public demonstrate that partisans often diverge not only on questions of opinion but also on matters of fact. However, little is known about partisan divergence in factual beliefs among the government officials who make real policy decisions, or how it compares to belief polarization among the public. This letter describes the first systematic comparison of factual belief polarization between the public and government officials, which we conducted using a paired survey approach. The results indicate that political elites are consistently more accurately informed than the public across a wide range of politically contentious facts. However, this increase in accuracy does not translate into reduced factual belief polarization. These findings demonstrate that a more informed political elite does not necessarily mitigate partisan factual disagreement in policy making.

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Published date: 1 July 2021

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 500593
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/500593
ISSN: 0007-1234
PURE UUID: f38a7e7f-ffbe-4737-9389-3ab7e8beba51
ORCID for Jason Reifler: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0002-1116-7346

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Date deposited: 06 May 2025 16:58
Last modified: 24 Jun 2025 02:15

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Contributors

Author: Nathan Lee
Author: Brendan Nyhan
Author: Jason Reifler ORCID iD
Author: DJ Flynn

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