How political scandals affect the electorate.
- Author(s)
- Christian von Sikorski, Raffael Heiss, Jörg Matthes
- Abstract
Political scandals are highly relevant for political decision-making and democratic processes more generally. While most prior research employed experimental and cross-sectional survey studies, we tested the effects of a political scandal in the context of the 2017 Austrian Parliamentary Elections using panel data (N = 559, both waves). Importantly, we used a unique data set collected before and just after a major scandal broke in the final election phase. Drawing on a motivated reasoning perspective, attribution theory, and the inclusion/exclusion model, our results revealed a scandal-eroding effect particularly damaging a candidate's own base of supporters and leaving followers in disappointment. The findings also showed a negative scandal-spillover effect for candidate supporters high in scandal knowledge decreasing political trust toward other politicians. Importantly, the results revealed that negative candidate evaluations are not a necessary precondition for negative spillover effects on political trust more generally.
- Organisation(s)
- Department of Communication
- External organisation(s)
- MCI Management Center Innsbruck, Universität Koblenz-Landau
- Journal
- Political Psychology
- Volume
- 41
- Pages
- 549-568
- No. of pages
- 20
- ISSN
- 0162-895X
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12638
- Publication date
- 06-2020
- Peer reviewed
- Yes
- Austrian Fields of Science 2012
- 508007 Communication science, 508014 Journalism
- Keywords
- ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Experimental and Cognitive Psychology, Clinical Psychology, Philosophy, Social Psychology, Political Science and International Relations, Sociology and Political Science
- Portal url
- https://ucris.univie.ac.at/portal/en/publications/how-political-scandals-affect-the-electorate(9379e503-c1f2-4caf-bba6-d11544fabaaa).html