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Cited by 14Electoral Systems and Political ParticipationSurvey Methodology and NonresponseMedia Influence and Politics

Political surveys bias self‐reported economic perceptions

Open access
Bailey, Jack·2022·Public Opinion Quarterly
DOI 10.1093/poq/nfab054
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Abstract

If voters are to hold governments to account for the state of the economy, they must know how it has changed. Indeed, this is a prerequisite for democratic accountability. Yet the perceptions that voters report often show signs of clear partisan bias. At present, we do not know if this bias is real or instead due to priming in political surveys. To test this, I assign subjects at random to either a political or nonpolitical survey. I then record their economic perceptions and compare the results for each group. I show that political surveys do worsen partisan bias, though only among supporters of the incumbent party. Still, much partisan bias remains unexplained, even in the nonpolitical condition. So, while economic perception items remain biased, we can at least be sure that most people respond to them in a similar way no matter the survey context.

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  • Bailey (2021) randomly assigned UK subjects to a political or apolitical survey and found that Conservative Party backers gave more positive assessments of the economy in the political survey.

    “For instance, Bailey (2021) randomly assigned UK subjects to take either a political or an apolitical survey and then asked them about their perceptions of the economy.Those who backed the ruling Conservative Party gave more positive assessments of the economy in the political survey-the political survey cued them that they should view the economy through a partisan lens.”

    From Measuring affective polarization: Matching concepts to measures (2026) · cites this paper as Bailey (2021)

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Research works printed but not linked: 5

  1. Agresti, Alan. 2010. Analysis of Ordinal Categorical Data. 2nd ed. Wiley Series in Probability and Statistics. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley.
  2. Campbell, Angus, Philip E. Converse, Warren E. Miller, and Donald E. Stokes. 1960. The American Voter. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
  3. ---. 1981. "Sociotropic Politics: The American Case." British Journal of Political Science 11 (2): 129-61. https://doi.org/10.2307/193580. · DOI
  4. Kruschke, John. 2015. Doing Bayesian Data Analysis: A Tutorial with R, JAGS, and Stan. Second. Cambridge, MA: Academic Press.
  5. McElreath, Richard. 2020. Statistical Rethinking: A Bayesian Course with Examples in R and Stan. Second. CRC Texts in Statistical Science. Boca Raton: CRC Press.

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Authors
Bailey, J.
Affiliations
University of Manchester (GB)
Corresponding author
Bailey, Jack
ORCID
Bailey, Jack
Venue
Public Opinion Quarterly
Publisher
Oxford University Press (OUP)
Published
2021-11-09
Volume
85
Issue
4
Pages
987-1008
ISSN
  • 0033-362X (ISSN-L)
  • 1537-5331
DOI
10.1093/poq/nfab054
OpenAlex
W4225614984
Cited by
14
References
54
Citations by year
2026: 4 · 2025: 4 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 1
FWCI
4.99
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Public Opinion Quarterly (publishedVersion)
  • Research Explorer (The University of Manchester) (publishedVersion, other-oa)
Funders
Economic and Social Research Council (ES/P000665/1)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Electoral Systems and Political Participation
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Survey Methodology and Nonresponse
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Media Influence and Politics
Keywords
political surveys, economic perceptions, partisan bias, electoral accountability

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