Confirmation bias and signaling in Downsian elections

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Millner, Antony; Ollivier, Helene; Simon, Leo
• 署名单位: University of California System; University of California Santa Barbara; Paris School of Economics; Monash University; University of California System; University of California Berkeley
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0047-2727
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2020.104175
• 发表日期: 2020
• 关键词: Confirmation bias; Electoral competition; Pandering; signaling

摘要

How do voters' behavioural biases affect political outcomes? We study this question in a model of Downsian electoral competition in which candidates have private information about the benefits of policies, and voters may infer candidates' information from their electoral platforms. If voters are Bayesian, candidates 'anti-pander' - they choose platforms that are more extreme than is justified by their private beliefs. However, anti-pandering is ameliorated if voters' inferences are subject to confirmation bias. Voter confirmation bias causes elections to aggregate candidates' information better, and all observers, whether biased or Bayesian, would like the voters in our model to exhibit more confirmation bias than they do themselves. (C) 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.