Modeling Exposure, Stereotyping and Rationalization Effects on the Evaluation of Political Candidates

这项研究的理论和研究设计代表了一种努力，以揭示候选人评估的心理基础。本研究的目的是将以往关于候选人评价的研究成果整合到一个新的理论框架中，将候选人评价视为信息加工。这项研究分两个相互关联的浪潮进行：第一，将进行一系列三项研究，以发现政治候选人信息内容的规律性。然后，这些初步的基本调查结果将作为研究报告第二部分的基础--试图通过具体的心理和政治框架，为调查设计政治候选人的评价和形象。研究项目的第一步需要深入研究政治信息对个人意味着什么。特别是，研究人员将调查有关特定政治问题的各个方面的信息，以及候选人和相关政治团体的个人特征。候选人的某些信息在多大程度上对人们来说是“突出的”或重要的？他们会对了解候选人的一件事很感兴趣，而对另一件事却不感兴趣吗？下一步，研究人员将确定这些信息是否具有超越信息简单、表面意义的某些内涵、暗示或解释。例如，某一种特定类型的信息是否会让人相信候选人还有其他相关特征？在获得了关于哪些信息往往是重要的和“有意义的丰富”的数据之后，研究的第二部分讨论了在重要性和解释方面不同的信息如何被结合到候选人评估中。在研究的这个阶段，一个关键因素是候选人信息的呈现顺序。结果将显示不同顺序的信息如何纳入评价，以及对候选人的“持续”评价如何改变后续信息对最终评价的影响程度。总而言之，本研究将解开信息对候选人评价的三个影响：突显、解释和顺序。研究项目的设计需要两个相关的研究；第一个是确定候选人信息的重要性和解释，第二个是系统地操纵个人接收预先测试的信息的顺序。这项研究不仅将指出信息的重要性、解释和顺序如何共同影响彼此对候选人评价的影响，而且还将说明如何改变重要性和解释以“适应”一个人对候选人的先前评价。

The theory and research design for this research represents an effort to uncover the psychological underpinnings of candidate evaluations. The goal of the research is to integrate previous findings on candidate evaluation into a new theoretical framework which treats candidate evaluation as information processing. The research occurs in two, inter-related waves: First, a series of three studies will be undertaken to discover regularities in the content of information about political candidates. These initial, base-line findings will then serve as the basis for the second part of the study - - an attempt at constructing, by way of specific psychological and political frameworks, evaluations and images of political candidates designed for the investigation. The first step of the research project requires an indepth study of what political information means to individuals. In particular, the researchers will investigate various facets of information about specific political issues, as well as that for personal characteristics of the candidate and relevant political groups. To what extent is certain information about a candidate "salient," or important to people? Would they be very much interested in knowing one particular thing about a candidate, but not another? Next, the researchers will ascertain whether this information has certain connotations, implications, or interpretations that reach beyond the simple, surface meaning of the information. For example, does one particular type of information lead people to believe that the candidate has other relevant characteristics? Having thus obtained data about what information tends to be important and "meaningfully rich," the second part of the study deals with how information, which differs in terms of its importance and interpretation, is combined into a candidate evaluation. A crucial factor at this stage of the study is the order in which the candidate information is presented. Results will indicate how different orders of information is integrated into an evaluation, as well as how "on- going" evaluations of the candidate alters the extent to which subsequent information influences a final evaluation. Altogether, this study will disentangle three influences of information upon candidate evaluation: salience, interpretation, and order. The design of the research project requires two related studies; the first to ascertain the importance and interpretations of candidate information, the second to systematically manipulate the order in which individuals receive the pre-tested information. The study will not only indicate how information salience, interpretation and order jointly influence the impact of one another upon candidate evaluations, but also how importance and interpretation can be altered to "fit" a person's prior evaluation of the candidate.