Informative campaigning in multidimensional politics: The role of naïve voters

2021 ◽  
pp. 095162982110611
Author(s):  
Satoshi Kasamatsu ◽  
Daiki Kishishita

This paper aims to investigate the possibility that electoral campaigning transmits truthful information in a situation where campaigning has a direct persuasive effect on a subset of the electorate called “naïve voters.” To this end, we construct a multi-sender signaling game in which an incumbent and a challenger decide whether to focus on policy or ability in electoral campaigning, and a media outlet then decides whether to gather news. Voters are divided into sophisticated and naïve voters. We demonstrate that a candidate's strategy regarding their issues of focus (campaign messages) can signal his or her private information. Specifically, negative campaigning against the incumbent's ability signals the incumbent's low ability in all separating equilibria. It is also noteworthy that separating equilibria exist only when sophisticated and naïve voters coexist. This implies that a fraction of naïve voters has a non-monotonic effect on the possibility of transmitting truthful information.

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carol Anilowski Cain ◽  
Antonio J. Macias ◽  
Juan Manuel Sanchez
Keyword(s):  

Author(s):  
Kim Fridkin ◽  
Patrick Kenney

This book develops and tests the “tolerance and tactics theory of negativity.” The theory argues that citizens differ in their tolerance of negative campaigning. Also, candidates vary in the tactics used to attack their opponents, with negative messages varying in their relevance to voters and in the civility of their tone. The interplay between citizens’ tolerance of negativity and candidates’ negative messages helps clarify when negative campaigning will influence citizens’ evaluations of candidates and their likelihood of voting. A diverse set of data sources was collected from U.S. Senate elections (e.g., survey data, experiments, content analysis, focus groups) across several years to test the theory. The tolerance and tactics theory of negativity receives strong empirical validation. First, people differ systematically in their tolerance for negativity, and their tolerance changes over the course of the campaign. Second, people’s levels of tolerance consistently and powerfully influence how they assess negative messages. Third, the relevance and civility of negative messages consistently influence citizens’ assessments of candidates competing for office. That is, negative messages focusing on relevant topics and utilizing an uncivil tone produce significant changes in people’s impressions of the candidates. Furthermore, people’s tolerance of negativity influences their susceptibility to negative campaigning. Specifically, relevant and uncivil messages are most influential for people who are least tolerant of negative campaigning. The relevance and civility of campaign messages also alter people’s likelihood of voting, and the impact of negative messages on turnout is more consequential for people with less tolerance of negativity.


Epidemiologia ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-94
Author(s):  
Mst. Marium Begum ◽  
Osman Ulvi ◽  
Ajlina Karamehic-Muratovic ◽  
Mallory R. Walsh ◽  
Hasan Tarek ◽  
...  

Background: Chikungunya is a vector-borne disease, mostly present in tropical and subtropical regions. The virus is spread by Ae. aegypti and Ae. albopictus mosquitos and symptoms include high fever to severe joint pain. Dhaka, Bangladesh, suffered an outbreak of chikungunya in 2017 lasting from April to September. With the goal of reducing cases, social media was at the forefront during this outbreak and educated the public about symptoms, prevention, and control of the virus. Popular web-based sources such as the top dailies in Bangladesh, local news outlets, and Facebook spread awareness of the outbreak. Objective: This study sought to investigate the role of social and mainstream media during the chikungunya epidemic. The study objective was to determine if social media can improve awareness of and practice associated with reducing cases of chikungunya. Methods: We collected chikungunya-related information circulated from the top nine television channels in Dhaka, Bangladesh, airing from 1st April–20th August 2017. All the news published in the top six dailies in Bangladesh were also compiled. The 50 most viewed chikungunya-related Bengali videos were manually coded and analyzed. Other social media outlets, such as Facebook, were also analyzed to determine the number of chikungunya-related posts and responses to these posts. Results: Our study showed that media outlets were associated with reducing cases of chikungunya, indicating that media has the potential to impact future outbreaks of these alpha viruses. Each media outlet (e.g., web, television) had an impact on the human response to an individual’s healthcare during this outbreak. Conclusions: To prevent future outbreaks of chikungunya, media outlets and social media can be used to educate the public regarding prevention strategies such as encouraging safe travel, removing stagnant water sources, and assisting with tracking cases globally to determine where future outbreaks may occur.


2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 278-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melis Kartal

New relationships are often plagued with uncertainty because one of the players has some private information about her “type.” The reputation literature has shown that equilibria that reveal this private information typically involve breach of trust and conflict. But are these inevitable for equilibrium learning? I analyze self-enforcing relationships where one party is privately informed about her time preferences. I show that there always exist honest reputation equilibria, which fully reveal information and support cooperation without breach or conflict. I compare these to dishonest reputation equilibria from several perspectives. My results are applicable to a broad class of repeated games. (JEL C73, D82, D83, D86, Z13)


Author(s):  
Alberto López Ortega

AbstractConcerns about the use of online political microtargeting (OPM) by campaigners have arisen since the Cambridge Analytica scandal hit the international political arena. In addition to providing conceptual clarity on OPM and explore the use of such techniques in Europe, this paper seeks to empirically disentangle the differing behaviours of campaigners when they message citizens through microtargeted rather than non-targeted campaigning. More precisely, I hypothesise that campaigners use negative campaigning and are more diverse in terms of topics when they use OPM. To investigate whether these expectations hold true, I use text-as-data techniques to analyse an original dataset of 4,091 political Facebook Ads during the last national elections in Austria, Italy, Germany and Sweden. Results show that while microtargeted ads might indeed be more thematically diverse, there does not seem to be a significant difference to non-microtargeted ads in terms of negativity. In conclusion, I discuss the implications of these findings for microtargeted campaigns and how future research could be conducted.


2019 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-219 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Craig Andrews ◽  
Kristen L. Walker ◽  
Jeremy Kees

At present, very little is known about what might encourage children and teens to limit access to their private information online and to restrict what they share on social media and video sites. Federal and state agencies face challenges encouraging companies to help children, teens, and parents protect their information online. The authors extend previous cognitive defense research by examining (1) effects beyond advertising as applied to information privacy online; (2) not only children’s/teens’ beliefs and knowledge, but also their online privacy decisions; (3) multiple age categories; (4) multiple cognitive defense strategies (educational video, quiz with feedback, or absence of a strategy); and (5) children’s/teens’ motivation to restrict what they share online. Key results indicate significant effects of the quiz and educational video over the absence of a strategy in enhancing favorable online safety beliefs and in restricting online sharing. Findings also demonstrate the role of perceived parental influence and for agencies to offer privacy education campaigns to help empower children to protect their privacy. Implications for policy and privacy research are discussed.


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