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The invented state : policy misperceptions in the American public / Emily Thorson.
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Thorson, Emily A., author.
- Series:
- Journalism and political communication unbound.
- Oxford scholarship online.
- Journalism and political communication unbound
- Oxford scholarship online
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Political culture--United States.
- Political culture.
- Misinformation--United States.
- Misinformation.
- Polarization (Social sciences)--Political aspects--United States.
- Polarization (Social sciences).
- Public opinion--United States.
- Public opinion.
- United States--Politics and government--21st century.
- United States.
- United States--Politics and government--Public opinion.
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource (0 pages)
- Place of Publication:
- New York, NY : Oxford University Press, 2024.
- Summary:
- Many Americans hold substantial misperceptions about what the government actually does. However, they get the facts wrong not because they are lazy, stupid, or blinded by partisan loyalty. Rather, information about existing policy is largely unavailable to them. News coverage instead prioritizes strategy, novelty, and change. Faced with these gaps in their knowledge, people often engage in inductive reasoning about public policies, especially when they care deeply about a particular issue. They draw on cues from the environment (often including misleading information from elites) and their own cognitive heuristics to make inferences about what the government does. Many of these inferences are incorrect, and taken together they make up what I call the "invented state": widespread misperceptions about public policy.
- Contents:
- Introduction : misperceptions that matter
- The contours of the invented state
- The policy gap in the information environment
- The construction of beliefs about policy
- How people interpret policy information
- Policy misperceptions and competence
- Dismantling the invented state
- Conclusion : what comes next?
- Notes:
- Also issued in print: 2024.
- Includes bibliographical references and index.
- Description based on online resource and publisher information; title from PDF title page (viewed on November 1, 2023).
- ISBN:
- 0-19-751236-4
- 0-19-751234-8
- 0-19-751235-6
- OCLC:
- 1395900286
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