1. Theories of Learning and Judgment Last time: –signalling models –prospect theory On-line processing

2. Signaling models Cheap talk –under what conditions can a listener learn about the world from a sender who pays no costs and bears no risk for communicating? –key condition is similarity of preferences if sender’s goals and receiver’s goals don’t conflict, no incentive to mislead; if they are congruent, this is a coordination game –true cheap talk is rare in politics because repeated interactions/overlapping generations allow for reputations to develop reputations/brand names are commitment mechanisms; a candidate/commentator with one can be persuasive even without similarity of goals

3. Costly Talk Reputation is an example of risky talk –sender puts valuable reputation up as bond; loss of reputation is example of a penalty for lying Other examples of learning from signals –costly action: sender pays a fee to send a signal –verification: sender’s statement can be evaluated by a third party who is motivated to expose falsehoods (e.g., the press) Preference for biased information sources –when a liberal says something good about a conservative, or vice-versa

4. Priming and Framing Kahneman & Tversky’s prospect theory –conventional expected utility maximization models tend to use symmetric utility functions –K&T hypothesize an evaluative asymmetry between the domain of losses and the domain of gains –decision frames describe the psychological context surrounding an individual’s choice priming is raising the salience of a particular issue or context framing is the manipulation of the decision frame surrounding a person’s opinion-formation on a question

5. Prospect theory and politics Implication: spin control is potentially important –binary choices can be reversed via subtle changes in decision frame Who controls the policy/issue agenda? How much room is there for priming by strategic actors in politics? Who controls the selection of decision frame? –do different people choose different frames? If so, why and under what conditions?

6. On-line processing How do we know what people know and how they make judgments? Lodge, McGraw and Stroh: 2 models of candidate evaluation –memory-based model: current judgment is based on a (perhaps unbiased) assessment of recalled data –impression-driven model: current judgment based on a retrieval of a “running tally” of marginal judgments; the data bits on which the judgments are based may be disposed of

7. Relating Prospect Theory to Judgment “Agenda control” in campaigns can matter –If candidate A’s position on issue 1 is more popular than candidate B’s position on issue 1, and vice-versa for issue 2; and voters are on-line processers, A focus on issue 1 raises A relative to B; staying “on message” may have a cumulative effect –If two alternative decision frames α and β can be used to describe issue 1, with α more favorable to candidate A and β more favorable to candidate B Messages that use framing α will tend to raise A relative to B; staying “on message” may have a cumulative effect