Casual Models of Partisan Minds
Do Americans see partisanship as the source of other citizens’ policy preferences, or do they believe policy preferences determine what party others choose? These two worldviews induce divergent responses to information about others’ issue concerns: if party is a cause, then different issue concerns are correlated outcomes, but if it is a consequence, then different issues are substitute explanations. Using a laboratory experiment, I find that political independents consistently interpret others’ actions according to a policy-motivated theory, but partisans apply a double standard: they attribute co-partisans’ policy preferences to individual preference, but attribute out-partisans’ policy preferences to partisanship. However, these beliefs are not immutable; as participants learn about the variability in policy preferences within each party, they increasingly attribute others’ actions to issue-motivations.