Information effect (political sociology)

The information effect is a term used in political sociology and is part of the discussion about the effects of the general low level of knowledge of the population on democracy . According to Althaus, information effects denote a distortion of the collective preferences that would exist if everyone in a population were equally well informed about politics. Under collective preferences , the results are understood by surveys that shed should give about the interests, wishes and needs of citizens and especially play a central role in the US.

Origin of the method

Scott L. Althaus , Professor of Political Science at Northwestern University , is critical of Lau & Redlawsk's theory of collective rationality and other approaches that postulate that the general low level of political knowledge of the population is not a problem for democracy. It focuses on the effects of the low level of knowledge on the results of a survey , the so-called collective preferences, and shows the mechanisms that are triggered by the generally low level of political knowledge, as well as their effects. Building on the work of Delli Carpini and Keeter as well as Bartels, Althaus developed a method for simulating the informed preferences and thus a method for measuring the influence that political knowledge has on collective preferences.

The role of surveys in political life

With doubts about the traditional channels through which citizens 'interests are conveyed to politicians, there was the rise of surveys , which were ascribed representativeness and scientific quality and which for the first time provided detailed information about citizens' opinions. This information is used by politicians in two main ways: to formulate policies and to identify issues that require political action. In this way, the results of surveys can directly influence policy and their accuracy becomes immediately relevant.

Background: low level of knowledge and socially unequal distribution of knowledge

The results of surveys show over and over again that large parts of the population do not even have basic knowledge about people, topics or rules of political life. As pollster George Gallup noted: "Overall, it appears that there has been no improvement over four decades". But not only the generally low level of knowledge is problematic; The socially unequal distribution of knowledge is also critical. It has a clear pattern of demographic characteristics: for example, the proportion of college graduates among the best-informed is 2.25 times that of the general population; Likewise, people in management positions and academics make up 41% of the best-informed, despite a share of only 21% of the total population; Women make up 55% of those surveyed, but their share among the best-informed is only 36%.

Effects of low knowledge

Individual level

The first problem relates to the representation of voices in the collective preferences. It arises from the fact that poorly informed people often exclude themselves from the survey: ignorance of the political facts leads to a decision in favor of a “don't know” answer; this means that their voice is lost from the start with regard to the chance of political influence.

A second problem lies in the representation of interests in collective preferences. Only with the necessary background knowledge can people arrive at political preferences that actually correspond to their attitudes, wishes and needs and express these preferences in surveys.

Collective level

If the poorly informed and the well-informed people are viewed as two groups, then within the group of those who are informed there is a much greater division of opinions on a topic. It is the least well-informed whose opinions are most similar, or more precisely: whose answers focus more on the same answer categories. This is because poorly informed people make their judgments more on the basis of heuristics and, in particular, also use clues in the question or the order of the questions. In surveys, this can mean that the split answers within the group of well-informed people tend to even out, so that the more uniform answers of the less-informed group are given greater weight. Althaus calls this consequence of the distribution of preferences the dispersion effect.

As shown in the simulation, it is this mechanism that carries the most weight. This has clear consequences: It is precisely the people who cannot adequately communicate their interests (and whose expressed preferences therefore often do not correspond to their actual wishes) who have the greatest influence on the collective preference.

Old house model

Informed preferences are now understood to be the preferences that should be obtained if no information effects existed; d. That is, all people would be equally and equally well informed.

Theoretical basis

The basic idea behind Althaus` method for estimating the actual collective preferences is derived from the idea of "enlightened preferences" (Mansbridge) and reads as follows: If all were members of a certain demographic group - that is, all people who share exactly the same demographic characteristics - as well-informed as the best-informed member, they should all arrive at the same political preferences as that person.

method

The estimation of informed preferences is a purely statistical process. The distribution of the preferences of the best-informed members of a demographic group is carried over to all members of this group. The method consists of a four-step process: 1. A regression analysis is performed which includes the demographic characteristics, political knowledge and a number of variables of the interaction between political knowledge and each of the demographic characteristics. The result is a set of regression coefficients . 2. For each person, the scale value of political knowledge is raised to the level that the best-informed respondent achieved. 3. The coefficients from step 1 are inserted into the actual demographic characteristics of the person, with the values on the knowledge scale and the interaction terms being replaced by the new values from step 2. 4. The thus simulated informed preferences for each person are aggregated. This is how one obtains the collective preferences, adjusted for information effects. These are then compared with the collective preferences measured in the survey in order to determine the extent of the influence of political knowledge.

Results

extent

The results relate to the American region, as data from the American National Election Studies were used for the simulation . Overall, the information effects are rather small, but they are sometimes of great importance. The reason for this is that the distribution of the information effects on the topics is not uniform: While in almost half of the questions the correction of the information effect only led to a slight change, the other 52% showed changes of up to 15 percentage points (Average 9.3). The consequence of this distribution is that there are subject areas in which higher knowledge leads to significant changes - in some cases even to a reversal of the majority situation and thus to a completely different collective preference than measured in the survey. Overall, this was the case for 28.1% of the survey questions.

Direction of change

Questions that require assessment show a relatively clear pattern: the simulated informed preferences show less appreciation for Congress, the President, and the President's handling of specific policy areas. Political questions reveal three tendencies: In foreign policy , the informed public is more interested in foreign affairs, but more reluctant to use military force. The second pattern spans a wide range of sociopolitical issues and, after the information effects have been corrected, shows fundamentally more progressive attitudes, particularly with regard to legal issues. The third trend shows a more ideologically conservative attitude towards informed preferences. Questions about equality and civil rights showed a more egalitarian attitude among the informed public. On the other hand, questions about morality showed a less progressive attitude.

criticism

Althaus himself already cites possible points of criticism of his model, such as specification errors, inadequate measurement of political knowledge or incorrect representation of group interests by the most informed members, e.g. due to unrecognized influences. Also is used by Pappi criticized that the assumptions of the model would be too static, since no mobilization processes are taken into account. Althaus' thesis opposes approaches of collective rationality and the socio-psychological construct of on-line processing and it is up to the reader which works he is more convinced of. However, comparisons with the deliberative polling approach show that the construct appears to be valid. Under the restriction made by Althaus himself that the simulated preferences are not necessarily identical to the actual, informed preferences, it can at least be said that the model is a useful tool for determining the influence of political knowledge in different areas.

literature

Collective Preferences in Democratic Politics: opinion surveys and the will of the people, Scott L. Althaus, Cambridge University Press, 2003
For an overview: Information Effects in Collective Preferences, Scott L. Althaus, The American Political Science Review, Vol. 92, No. 3 (Sep., 1998), pp. 545-558
Uninformed Votes: Information Effects in Presidential Elections, Larry M. Bartels, American Journal of Political Science, Vol. 40, No. 1 (Feb., 1996), pp. 194-230
What Americans Know About Politics and Why It Matters, Michael X. Delli Carpini, Scott Keeter, Yale University press, 1996