Persistent Polarizing Effects of Persuasion: Experimental Evidence from Turkey

Abstract

I evaluate randomly varied neighborhood exposure to information campaigns regarding either executive performance, or increases in executive power, prior to a Turkish referendum on weakening checks and balances on the executive. The campaigns increased voter polarization over the referendum, and subsequently changed party affiliation in national and local elections over the next two years, leading to partisan polarization. My results suggest that, when voters disagree on whether increasing executive power is a good policy, more information can increase voter polarization. Finally, I conclude that because potential polarization is often ignored, the impact of information campaigns on civil society is underestimated. (JEL D72, D83, O17)

Double‐blind peer review affects reviewer ratings and editor decisions at an ecology journal

“…A previous randomized trial by Blank (1991) likewise concluded that double-blind review did not differentially affect papers authored by women and men, although sample sizes were too small to have confidence in the negative result (despite being a large study, only a small proportion of papers were by female authors). Our study is large enough, and the proportion of women high enough, that we have confidence in our conclusion that blinding of author identities does not affect gender differences in peer review outcomes.…”

“…Some find that papers authored by women are rated lower or have lower acceptance rates in academic journals (Fox et al, 2019; Murray et al, 2018; Walker et al, 2015; and references therein), but others have failed to find gender differences in peer review outcomes, or have even found that papers authored by women perform better than those authored by men (Lerback & Hanson, 2017; Squazzoni et al, 2021). Other biases, such as favouring papers by authors from the same country or that speak the same language as the reviewer (Murray et al, 2018), favouring authors from higher‐income (Demarest et al, 2014; Harris, Macinko, et al, 2017; Harris, Marti, et al, 2017; Kowal et al, 2022; Saposnik et al, 2014) or English‐speaking countries (Ross et al, 2006; Saposnik et al, 2014), discriminating based on author race (Nakamura et al, 2021), favouring papers by authors that are from prestigious institutions (Blank, 1991; Tomkins et al, 2017) or with prestigious reputations (Huber et al, 2022; Okike et al, 2016), favouring authors that are senior (Pleskac et al, 2021), or disfavouring newcomers to a discipline (Seeber & Bacchelli, 2017), can all distort the quality and fairness of peer review.…”

“…However, the effectiveness of double‐blind peer review in eliminating reviewer biases in scholarly journals is uncertain, partly because few randomized trials have manipulated the blinding of author identities on journal submissions. Of the trials that have been performed, most examine few or no author characteristics (McNutt et al, 1990; van Rooyen et al, 1998) or have sample sizes that are too small to have any confidence in negative results (Alam et al, 2011; Blank, 1991; Fisher et al, 1994; Godlee et al, 1998; Justice et al, 1998). The paucity of large‐scale manipulative studies directly testing the effects of blinding in a scholarly journal context leaves us uncertain how switching to double‐blind peer review will influence the review process at journals, and whether it will reduce the expression of conscious and unconscious biases by reviewers and editors.…”

Overcoming the gender bias in ecology and evolution: is the double-anonymized peer review an effective pathway over time?

“…In addition, the effectiveness of DA in reducing gender bias in publishing remains controversial. While in the fields of medicine and economics, no significant differences have been found between DA and SA peer review systems, with female authors achieving similar publication rates under both scenarios ( Blank, 1991 ; Cho et al, 1998 ; Justice et al, 1998 ; Mahajan et al, 2021 ), DA has been found to effectively reduce gender bias in computer science ( Tomkins, Zhang & Heavlin, 2017 ). In the EcoEvo field, DA has positively impacted the number of female authors in journals such as behavioral ecology ( Budden et al, 2008 ), but this increase in female authorship may be attributed to the overall female representation ( i.e ., relative number and proportion of publications) in the field over time ( Holman, Stuart-Fox & Hauser, 2018 ; Salerno et al, 2019 ), rather than the peer-review process per se ( Webb, O’Hara & Freckleton, 2008 ).…”

Geographical Concentration and Editorial Favoritism within the Field of Laboratory Experimental Economics (RM/19/029-revised-)

“…We therefore assume that our measure of reputation is not distorted by changes in the average number of authors.25 This requires that editors can identify authors (identities) despite the referee process being double blind. In a field experiment,Blank (1991) found that in AER's double blind referee process, about 50% of referees could correctly identify the authors. Given that many authors post preliminary versions of their papers online, we assume that, in many cases, editors can also identify the authors.…”