The Importance of Truth: Issue Positions and the Acceptability of Misinformation

• In Event: Information and Political Attitudes

Abstract

Many scholars suggest that we are now living in a post-truth era, in which opinions are influenced more by appeals to emotions and personal beliefs than by objective facts. The seriousness of the misinformation challenge for democracy specifically depends on the extent to which citizens continue to care about the truth, yet very few studies directly assess citizens’ attitudes towards the truth and the extent to which they are ready to accept misinformation to advance an agenda consistent with their issue positions.

Using a pre-registered survey experiment administered during the 2021 Canadian Election, this paper examines how the perceived acceptability of a politician spreading misinformation is influenced by the aim of the misinformation and citizens’ opinions about the issue. A representative sample of Canadian citizens was asked about how acceptable it is for a politician to spread false or misleading information on climate change and COVID-19 (to allow for comparability across issues) for different randomly assigned purposes: (1) no purpose specified (control); (2) for personal or political gains; (3) because they don’t know any better; (4) to protect the economy; (5) to encourage people to reduce their ecological footprint or comply with public health restrictions.

I hypothesize that there is a hierarchy of acceptability of misinformation, where false information shared for personal or political gains is perceived as the least acceptable and misinformation that can help achieve a socially desirable good is perceived as the most acceptable. I further expect that the perceived acceptability of spreading misinformation depends on individuals’ issue positions. Individuals who want more action on climate change or COVID-19 are likely to find it more acceptable for politicians to spread misinformation to encourage individuals to reduce their ecological footprint or comply with public health restrictions but less acceptable for misinformation to be spread for other purposes. Conversely, individuals who do not want more action on these issues might find it more acceptable for politicians to spread misinformation to protect the economy.

The findings have important democratic implications. If citizens do not care about the truth or do not condemn misinformation, politicians may have greater incentives to use misinformation to influence citizens’ political attitudes and behaviors, which can lead to suboptimal public policies and a lack of accountability. Finding a relationship between the strength of issue positions and the perceived acceptability of misinformation also means that issue polarization can make misinformation less condemnable, with important implications for the quality of information circulating about important societal issues.

Author

• Mathieu Lavigne, McGill University