Can Misperceptions Be Corrected? An Experiment on Public Fear of Terrorism

• In Event: Survey Experiments in Foreign Policy Studies

Abstract

Can objectively false foreign policy beliefs be corrected? From the perceived risks of terrorist attacks to the perceived requirements of the Paris Climate Accord, factual misperceptions are a widespread feature of contemporary foreign policy debates. Normatively, whether these entrenched factual misperceptions can be corrected is of crucial importance. In both domestic and foreign policy, misperceptions about the magnitude of threats like violent crime and terrorism have fueled vast government reactions to these issues, while inaccurate beliefs about the scope of abuses such as welfare and voter fraud have facilitated a growing opposition toward longstanding institutions. To address this question we conduct a survey experiment on 800 participants, investigating how responsive individuals are to factual information about the risks posed by terrorism, about which a particularly costly and sizable misperception exists among the U.S. public. Indeed, though the chance that an American is killed by a terror attack in a given year is approximately 1 in 4 million, polls show high and persistent levels of fear about the risks of terrorism among Americans, with 40% of the country afraid that they or their families will be victimized and 70% viewing large-scale attacks as likely in the near future. We find that misperceptions about the threat posed by terrorism are correctable, but corrections reinforced by a partisan cue are most effective and in some cases necessary. Moreover, despite effect attenuation, the corrective effect holds over two weeks when provided alongside a partisan cue. In sum, then, our results show that an entrenched misperception such as the inflated perception of terrorism as a threat in the U.S. is correctable, but that the most promising path is to reinforce the information with an "insider", such as a member of the target's relevant political party.

Authors

• Daniel Kent, The Ohio State University

• Daniel Silverman, Carnegie Mellon University