Does truth matter to voters? The effects of correcting political misinformation in an Australian sample
Does truth matter to voters? The effects of correcting political misinformation in an Australian sample
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DOI：
10.1098/rsos.180593
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发表时间：
2018-12-01
影响因子：
3.5
通讯作者：
Lewandowsky, Stephan
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Aird, Michael J.;Ecker, Ullrich K. H.;Lewandowsky, Stephan
在“后真相时代”，政治事实核查已成为一个具有重要意义的问题。最近一项以 2016 年美国大选为背景的研究发现，对唐纳德·特朗普言论的事实核查改变了参与者对这些言论的看法——无论参与者是否支持特朗普——但不会改变他们对特朗普的感受或投票意图。然而，该研究平衡了对不准确陈述的纠正与同等数量的对准确陈述的肯定。因此，事实核查对参与者投票意图和感受的无效影响可能就是由于这种人为创造的平衡而产生的。此外，特朗普的声明没有与反对派政客的声明进行对比，并且特朗普的真实性也没有得到衡量。本研究（N = 370）进一步研究了这个问题，操纵修正与肯定的比率，并使用来自政治光谱双方的澳大利亚政治家（和澳大利亚参与者）。我们假设事实核查会纠正信念，事实核查会影响选民的支持（即投票意图、感受和对真实性的看法），但前提是纠正的数量超过肯定的数量。这两种假设都得到了支持，表明政客的诚实有时对选民来说确实很重要。事实核查对政治光谱双方的影响相似，这表明在事实核查过程中几乎没有动机推理。
In the 'post-truth era', political fact-checking has become an issue of considerable significance. A recent study in the context of the 2016 US election found that fact-checks of statements by Donald Trump changed participants' beliefs about those statements-regardless of whether participants supported Trump-but not their feelings towards Trump or voting intentions. However, the study balanced corrections of inaccurate statements with an equal number of affirmations of accurate statements. Therefore, the null effect of fact-checks on participants' voting intentions and feelings may have arisen because of this artificially created balance. Moreover, Trump's statements were not contrasted with statements from an opposing politician, and Trump's perceived veracity was not measured. The present study (N = 370) examined the issue further, manipulating the ratio of corrections to affirmations, and using Australian politicians (and Australian participants) from both sides of the political spectrum. We hypothesized that fact-checks would correct beliefs and that fact-checks would affect voters' support (i.e. voting intentions, feelings and perceptions of veracity), but only when corrections outnumbered affirmations. Both hypotheses were supported, suggesting that a politician's veracity does sometimes matter to voters. The effects of fact-checking were similar on both sides of the political spectrum, suggesting little motivated reasoning in the processing of fact-checks.