Polarized Mass or Polarized Few? Assessing the Parallel Rise of Survey Nonresponse and Measures of Polarization

Cavari, Amnon; Freedman, Guy

doi:10.1086/695853

Cited by 16 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…Note, however, the considerable rise in political interest in the last two surveyed years (see Supplementary Material), which can indicate that politically interested individuals are more likely to answer surveys, rather than an actual increase of political interest in the population, thereby biasing the estimates and conclusions (cf. Cavari and Freedman 2018). Fourth, this is an exploratory analysis, and statistical tests should be interpreted with caution.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Selective Exposure to Public Service News over Thirty Years: The Role of Ideological Leaning, Party Support, and Political Interest

Dahlgren

2019

The International Journal of Press/Politics

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The transition from a low-choice to a high-choice media environment has led to concerns about audience fragmentation, ideological enclaves, and selective exposure to partisan news media consistent with people’s political preferences. However, previous research has mainly focused on two-party systems (e.g., the United States) and partisan news (e.g., Fox News or MSNBC), studied at single points in time. The aim of this paper is therefore to provide the most comprehensive study of which political preferences (ideological leaning, party support, and political interest) have driven selective exposure to public service news over thirty years, covering the transition from a low-choice to a high-choice media environment. Using an annual representative survey conducted from 1986 to 2015 in Sweden (n = 103,589), results suggest that (1) the ideological left and right have used public service news to the same extent over time and that (2) support for parties outside (rather than inside) parliament accounts for a large decline in public service news use over time. But most importantly, (3) those who lack political interest show the largest decline in public service news use, while public service news use has remained more stable among politically interested citizens.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Selective Exposure to Public Service News over Thirty Years: The Role of Ideological Leaning, Party Support, and Political Interest

Dahlgren

2019

The International Journal of Press/Politics

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“…Both survey response and completion rates have declined substantially in recent decades, with the steepest declines in the former among younger persons (Berinsky, 2008; Berinsky and Lavine, 2012). Some evidence suggests that those who choose not to respond to surveys at all (unit—as opposed to item—non‐response) are less informed overall and also less politically polarized (Cavari and Freedman, 2018). Early analysis of the relatively substantial polling errors in the 2020 Presidential election in many states suggest that those errors were in part the result of non‐random unit non‐response from those inclined to support Donald Trump (Cohn, 2020).…”

Section: Relevant Literaturesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The United States is, by many measures, deeply divided along political and cultural lines to a greater extent than any time in more than 100 years (Cavari and Freedman, 2018; Joslyn, 2020; LeCount, 2018; Mason, 2018; Metzl, 2019). There is a substantial decline in trust in institutions and a well‐documented withdrawal from the public sphere (Putnam, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Who Wants to Know? White Racial Attitudes and Survey Item Refusal on Gun Ownership Questions

LeCount

2021

Sociological Inquiry

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Research has long documented the fact that sensitive items on surveys are subject to relatively high levels of item response refusal, but the role played by respondent characteristics in shaping who refuses is underexplored. The present study integrates this methodological literature with a growing body of research concerned with the racialization of attitudes about gun ownership and policy among Whites in order to address this question. Specifically, this project investigates how racial attitudes influence survey item response refusal on items about gun ownership. Analyses of four distinct nationally representative samples suggest that racially conservative White respondents are more likely to refuse to respond to items concerned with gun ownership net of a host of relevant controls. Implications for the measurement of racial attitudes and gun‐related survey questions are discussed.

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“…Granted, when the quantifiers needed in the polarization claims so as to accurately describe groups are 'most' or 'all' then the same problem as before will arise. But, even though it is often suggested that political polarization is pervasive and increasing, several studies indicate that this might be an exaggeration (Cavari & Freedman, 2018;Tappin & McKay, 2019;Westwood, Peterson, & Lelkes, 2019). For instance, in experiments with more than 6000 people, Klar et al (2018) found that although some Americans are indeed affectively polarized, many "more simply want to avoid talking about politics.…”

Section: Acknowledging Variations In the Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

How (many) descriptive claims about political polarization exacerbate polarization

Peters

2021

J. Soc. Polit. Psych.

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Recently, researchers and reporters have made a wide range of claims about the distribution, nature, and societal impact of political polarization. Here I offer reasons to believe that even when they are correct and prima facie merely descriptive, many of these claims have the highly negative side effect of increasing political polarization. This is because of the interplay of two factors that have so far been neglected in the work on political polarization, namely that (1) people tend to conform to descriptive norms (i.e., norms capturing [perceptions of] what others commonly do, think, or feel), and that (2) claims about political polarization often convey such norms. Many of these claims thus incline people to behave, cognize, and be affectively disposed in ways that contribute to social division. But there is a silver lining. People’s tendency to conform to descriptive norms also provides the basis for developing new, experimentally testable strategies for counteracting political polarization. I outline three.

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Polarized Mass or Polarized Few? Assessing the Parallel Rise of Survey Nonresponse and Measures of Polarization

Cited by 16 publications

References 16 publications

Selective Exposure to Public Service News over Thirty Years: The Role of Ideological Leaning, Party Support, and Political Interest

Selective Exposure to Public Service News over Thirty Years: The Role of Ideological Leaning, Party Support, and Political Interest

Who Wants to Know? White Racial Attitudes and Survey Item Refusal on Gun Ownership Questions

How (many) descriptive claims about political polarization exacerbate polarization

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