Political Psychology Final

Black Utility Heuristic

1. Black voters make political decisions by asking “is this good for the Black community?”

2. Being rich does not protect you from racism 

   1. Ex: police brutality 

Social Sanctioning

1. Alternative: even if Black voters want to be republican, they may worry about what other Black people will think 

2. All identities come with expectations about how to behave, and breaking those expectations can have consequences

Racialized policies

1. Are government programs that are framed as primarily benefitting some racial and ethnic groups while harming others 

   1. Welfare–become very racialized because many politicians have been complicit in framing welfare→ implicitly understood as something that helps black people

   2. Affirmative action 

      1. Admissions process, providing people of color with an extra advantage in admissions→ illegal now

Symbolic racism

1. argument says that white Americans oppose these policies because they are prejudiced against African Americans (even if they won’t admit it)

Principled conservatism

1. argument says that white Americans oppose these policies because they believe in equity and fairness

Expressive responding

1. Sincere beliefs: republican voters may actually believe the election was stolen

2. even if they dont believe it, republicans may say the election was stolen to express support for trump 

   1. When people knowingly express false beliefs to express support for their political side

   2. Graham and yair find evidence that belief in the big lie is not expressive responding 

      1. After 2020 election, republicans bet money that trump would be president–not Biden 

      2. Among believers, half strongly beleive and half find it plausible but are not super convinced 

Intuitionists

1. 1. Feelings and instincts 

   2. Rely on feelings and instincts for making sense of the unknown

Rationalists

1. 1. Empirical evidence/ abstract deductions

   2. Rely on abstract deductions that are rooted in empirical evidence

Magical thinking

1. when we explain events by pointing at unobservable forces or beliefs rather than relying on rational or scientific reasoning. This cognitive process often involves attributing causality to supernatural or mystical elements.

EX: Illuminati, karma, religion, knock on wood 

1. Evil scientists 

2. Must contradict an alternative explanation based on observable forces

2. Why do people use magical thinking 

   1. Magical beliefs help us feel better and give us the illusion of control 

      1. I am smart enough to see through the government's secret plan to use COVID vaccines to plant chips

   2. Based on survival instincts developed in the course of evolution 

Dual processing model

1. says that our brain alternates between two different modes 

   1. Most of the time we use system 1: quick, impulsive, and mostly unconscious 

   2. More rarely we use system 2: slow, effortful, conscious 

   3. Ex you are driving and like zoned out which is the first system and then all of the sudden a car swerves and you very quickly change systems to evaluate the situation more carefully and respond appropriately.

2. Like our thinking in general, most of our thinking about politics rely on system 1

3. However political events that cause emotions like anxiety can cause us to switch to system 2 

4. We are then motivated to find information that will help us feel calm, even if not accurate

Representativeness heuristic

1. describes the tendency to assume that things that resemble each other share certain characteristics 

   1. Back in sep 2023, RFK J has 16% of the vote which is very high for a third-party candidate (last name is kennedy→representativeness heuristics) 

Availability heuristic

1. describes the tendency to make decisions based on the information that we can most easily recall rather than a full set of possible considerations 

   1. The economy is one of the most important predictors of whether a president will be reelected 

   2. However, researchers think that the only thing that matters is the economy in the year of the election 

   3. By contrast, presidents are not rewarded at all for cumulative economic growth over their four years

Confirmation bias

1. describes the tendency to seek out information that confirms what we already believe to be true

   1. Taber and Lodge ran experiment with supporters and opponents of gun control 

   2. They were given the choice to read stories showing that gun control was either good or bad 

   3. Supporters and opponents both chose stories that aligned with their prior beliefs

   4. Media we choose to consume

      1. Fox, msnbc, cnn

Materialists

1. experienced hardship in their youth, and think of politics as a way to provide for their own economic and physical security 

   1. Focused on the economy 

   2. Civil rights movement

Post-materialists

1. experiences security in their youth, and think of politics as a way to achieve belonging, respect, and self-actualization 

   1. Identity 

   2. Religion and public life 

   3. Transgender issues

Framing

The media has the power to spin stories to have a pos or neg perspective

Priming

1.  the media has the power to influence what considerations we use when evalutaitng politicians, policies, etc 

   1. When I evalute a politician, at any given time I could be drawing on many different things (tariffs or scandals) and the idea is that media can influence which of those things I am paying attention to 

   2. Priming me to think of inflation when I think of Joe Biden 

Agenda setting

 the media has the power to influence what issues we see as important

Internal political efficacy

refers to believing that you can understand and participate in politics

External political efficacy

1. refers to believing that the government will listen to you

Substantive representation

is the extent to which elected officials represent the interests and concerns of their constituents.

ex: womens rights

1. do decisionmakers care about womens interests?

   1. Ppl in power do things that are good for women

Descriptive representation

is the extent to which elected officials reflect the demographic characteristics of their constituents, such as race, gender, or socioeconomic status.

womens rights—>are women physically present when decisions are made?

Authoritative representation

1.  do women have authority in decision making spaces

any feature of communication among decision makers that affects their authority during the decision making process

Populism

1. Why might intuitionists be susceptible to populism 

   1. The engage in magical thinking by giving power to unobservable forces 

   2. They are guided by emotion: if something makes them feel good, it must be truePopulism is a rhetorical style that explains politics as a battle between the “people” and the “elites”

2. Traits of populism: rhetoric

   1. Explains politics as a battle between the virtuous “people” and a small group of nefarious, parasitic “elites”

   2. Trump– for too long a small gorup in our nation’s capital has reaped the rewards of government while the people have borne the cost

   3. Bernie–the greed of the billionaire class is destroying this country and whether they like it not we are going to stop that greed

3. Traits of populism: style

   1. Has a messy style that can seem oafish or boorish, like a drunken guest at a dinner party 

4. Traits of populism: pessimism 

   1. Doom is always around the corner, the economy is always a disaster, and the people are always under threat of being destroyed 

5. Why might intuitionists be susceptible to populism 

   1. The engage in magical thinking by giving power to unobservable forces 

   2. They are guided by emotion: if something makes them feel good, it must be true

Michael Dawson, Behind the Mule: Race and Class in African American Politics (1994),
Chapter 1

1. New black politics– characterized by the transformation of protest politics into electoral politics with high levels of black political unity 

   1. Image of profound political unity that transcends class

   2. However, the political consequences of class divisions are becoming more pronounced among African Americans

2. Why have african americans remained politically homogenous even while becoming economically polarized 

3. According to this line of reasoning, because the social, economic, and political realites of whites and blacks differ substaintially because of race, racial interests continue to override class interests

4. Two ways in which racial identity can become less salient

   1. If information about the political economic and social world of black America becomes less accessible 

   2. If race becomes less salient in individuals' own lives

Christopher DeSante, “Working Twice as Hard to Get Half as Far: Race, Work Ethic, and
America’s Deserving Poor” in American Journal of Political Science (2013)

1. Attitudes toward racialized and redistributive policies like welfare are often thought of as a function of both principled ideological positions and the underlying racial attitudes a person holds. Kinder and Sanders (1996) look at racial resentment as one explanation, while Sniderman and his colleagues look to principled conservatism and authoritarianism as viable alternatives, claiming that racial resentment is merely proxying a legitimate race-neutral commitment to equality of opportunity. This article engages this debate through an experimental design which tests whether "hard work" is rewarded in a color-blind manner. The experimental design also affords scholars the opportunity to separate the effects of the two components of racial resentment: principled values and racial animus. The results show that American norms and implicit racism serve to uniquely privilege whites in a variety of way

Lisa Garcia Bedolla, “They and We: Identity, Gender, and Politics among Latino Youth in
Los Angeles” in Social Science Quarterly (2000)

1. Objective–explore how latinos think about their identity, politics, voting, and community activity in order to gain some insight into the attitudes underlying Latino participation patterns

2. Methods– analysis of fifty in-depth interviews with latino high school seniors from neighboring schools 

3. Results

   1. All the respondents have a strong ethnic idenitty but vary in their degree of identification with the immigrant sectors of their community

   2. Most, especially the females, are not interested in formal politics 

   3. The respondents felt voting was important but did not feel confident about their ability to participate effectively

   4. The more sociioeconomically disadvantages felt more positive about the community’s ability to use nonelectoral activities to solve problems

1. 187 ballot measure 

   1. Majority saw measure as anti-mexican and was against it

   2. 80% of garfield repsondents cited identification with immigrants 

   3. MHS saw immigrants as “they”

      1. Distincion between legals and illegals 

Tali Mendelberg, Chris Karpowitz, and Baxter Oliphant, “Gender Inequality in Deliberation:
Unpacking the Black Box of Interaction” in Perspectives on Politics (2014) [pgs. 18 - 29
only]

1. Core question: women representation in spaces of power

   • Women are not equally represented

   • Experiment to think about if we had the ability to chage how pol decisions were made can we change the set up so women are more included

   
   

   Main idea: lets run an experient where we make little gov bodies (groups of 5) people are in charge of making decisions to see when women ar einturrpted ir not 

   • Groups of 0-5 women have to make a decision about allocation money

   • Some groups had a majority decision rule (whatever the majority decided that was the decision)

   • Some groups had a unanimous ride (had to have all groups support)

   FIndings: 

   Majority vs unanimous rule:

   • Majority rule:

     • Women are neg interrupted because they don't need them to pass the law

     • As there are more women in majority they are interrupted less and the interruptions are more pos 

   • Unanimous

     • Women experience less/consistent interruptions and they do experience interruptions but they are mos pos

Oliver and Wood, Enchanted America (2018), Preface, Introduction, and Chapter 1

1. Our central argument is that the most important political division in the US is not simply between liberals and conservatives or between “red” and “blue” states; rather it is between rationalist and intuitionists 

   1. Rationalists are people who comprehend reality using nonintuitive sources 

   2. Intentionalists are enchanted –rely on internal feelings as a guide to their external reality 

   3. Americans exists between these poles

Oliver and Wood, Enchanted America (2018), Chapter 5

1. Populism and conspiracy theories 

   1. People who arent trained in the social sciences often ocmprhend matters of power and money differently

      1. Employ commonsense of folk beliefs

      2. Compare it to things they know 

         1. Ex–compare it to their own household expenses

   2. Politics are the same way 

      1. Rely on things that are familiar or feel right

      2. Ex syrian refugee crisis→ understood the issue through the lens of inflated threat

   3. Populism and conspiracy 

      1. Both target the elites as the central problem 

      2. Btoh run counter to traditional description of politics

      3. Intuitive tendencies and magical thinking 

   4. Populism 

      1. Not an ideology but more of a rhetorical style 

      2. Simple description of politics as a conflict ultimately between a virtuious people and a small group of nefarious, parasitic elites

         1. Struggle between the people and the powerful 

         2. Good vs evil

         3. Winners vs losers

      3. Simple language

      4. MAGA

         1. Nostalgic longing 

         2. Privilege

         3. “If we dont get tough and if we dont get smart and fast were not going to have our cohutnry anymore” Trump

      5. Politics of intuition 

         1. Billionaire class

         2. Establishment politicians 

         3. As evil being with extraordinary powers they invoke a causal explanation for politics that is far different

      6. Magical qualities that ultimately separate populism from socialism 

2. Conspiracy theories 

   1. Any narrative about hidden, malevolent groups secretly perpetuating political plots and social calamities to further their own nefarious goal 

   2. Draw from shards of facts to rceate fantastical narratives

   3. Unseen or obscure forces are behind what is happening

Shana Kushner Gadarian and Bethany Albartson, “Anxiety, Immigration, and the Search for
Information” in Political Psychology (2014)

1. In this article we use the issue of immigration to explore the role of anxiety in response to political appeals. According to previous literautre, anxiety motivates citizens to learn and pay more attention to news coverage. Literature in psychology demonstrated that anxiety is associated with a tendency to pay closer attention to threatening information. We predict that anxious citizens will seek more information but that they will seek out and be attracted to threatening information. In an experiment, we induce anxiety about immigration and then subjects have the opportunity to search for additional information in a website designed to mimic online news sources. The website has both immigration and nonimmigration stories, and the immigration stories are split between threatening coverage and nonthreatening coverage. We find that anxious subjects exhibit biased information processing: they read, remember, and agree with threatening information 

2. Introduction 

   1. We argue that anxious citizens are motivated to seek political information but are attracted to threatening news

   2. Politicians and others regularly sound the alarm bells about the dire effects of immigration on the economic health and cultural fabris of the US

   3. The american public is torn on immigration but a significant portion of the public believes that immigrants, particularly undocumented, burden the country’s economic and social system 

3. Hypotheses 

   1. Manipulating anxiety about immigration will lead citizens to seek out information and that anxious individuals will seek more information than individuals in the control condition 

   2. Manipulating anxiety about immigration will lead to biased information processing

   3. Anxious individuals will be likely to evaluate threatening immigration stories more positively than nonthreatening immigration stories

Jennifer Lawless and Richard Fox, Girls Just Wanna Not Run: The Gender Gap in Young
Americans’ Political Ambition (2013)

1. Executive summary 

   1. Women are less likely than men to express interest in a political career

   2. Based on the results of a new survey, more than 2,100 college students between the ages of 18 and 25, we offer the first assessment of political ambition early in life. Young women are less likely than young men ever to have considered running for office, to express interest in a candidacy at some point in the future, or to consider elective office a desirable profession

   3. Our research suggests that the gender gap in ambition is already well in place by the time women and men enter their first careers

   4. 5 factors that contribute to the gender gap

      1. Young men are more likely than young women to be socialized by their parents to think about politics as a career path 

      2. From their school experiences to their peer associations to their media habits, young women tend to be exposed to less political information and discussion than do young men

      3. Young men are more likely than young women to have played organized sports and care about winning 

      4. Young women are less likely than young men to receive encouragement to run for office from anyone 

      5. Young women are less likely than young men to think they will be qualified to run for office, even once they are established in their careers

Tali Mendelberg, Katherine McCabe, and Adam Thal, “College Socialization and the Eco-
nomic Views of Affluent Americans” in American Journal of Political Science (2017)

1. Affluent americans support more conservative economic policies than the nonaffluent and government responds disproportionately to these views. Yet little is known about the emergence of these consequential views. We develop, test, and find support for a theory of class cultural norms. These preferences are partly traceable to socialization that occurs on predominately affluent college campuses, especially those with norms of financial gain, and especially among socially embedded students. These economic views of the students cohort also matter, in part independently of affluence. We use a large panel data set with a high response rate and more rigorous causal inference strategies than previous socialization studies. The affluent campus effect holds with matching, among students with limited school choice, and in a natural experiment, and it passes placebo tests. College sociaization partly explains why affluent americans support economically conservative policies

John Zaller, “Monica Lewinsky and the Mainsprings of American Politics” in Mediated Poli-
tics (2000)

1. What does move public opinion? What forces do drive american politics? 

2. The argument of this chapter is that presidents and their parties rise and fall in the publics esteem mainly according to how effectively they govern 

   1. Political accountability for war and peace, prosperity and recession, policies that work and policies that dont 

   2. Political parties, though given up for dead by how many political analysts are still the most important vehicle by which americans relate to politics and hold leaders accountable 

   3. Despite the rise of new forms of communication that might have been expected to destabilize it, american public opinion, at least as regards ot presidential politics, is no more volatile now than in the past

   4. Political fundamentals tend to trump media hype in national politics. By this I mean that politicians who can claim the high ground of peace, prosperity and moderation have dominatied presidential politics through most of this century and will continue to do so 

Calvert Jones and Celia Paris, “Its the End of the World and They Know It: How Dystopian
Fiction Shapes Political Attitudes” in Perspectives on Politics (2018)