Thaler, Michael;
(2023)
The Fake News Effect: Experimentally Identifying Motivated Reasoning Using Trust in News.
American Economic Journal: Microeconomics
, 16
(2)
pp. 1-38.
10.1257/mic.20220146.
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Abstract
Motivated reasoning posits that people distort how they process information in the direction of beliefs they find attractive. This paper creates a novel experimental design to identify motivated reasoning from Bayesian updating when people have preconceived beliefs. It analyzes how subjects assess the veracity of information sources that tell them the median of their belief distribution is too high or too low. Bayesians infer nothing about the source veracity, but motivated beliefs are evoked. Evidence supports politically-motivated reasoning about immigration, income mobility, crime, racial discrimination, gender, climate change, and gun laws. Motivated reasoning helps explain belief biases, polarization, and overconfidence.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | The Fake News Effect: Experimentally Identifying Motivated Reasoning Using Trust in News |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1257/mic.20220146 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1257/mic.20220146 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This version is the version of record. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions. |
| Keywords: | Motivated reasoning, biased beliefs, polarization, fake news |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS > Dept of Economics |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10170972 |
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