Own-Party Bias: How Voters Evaluate Electoral Outcomes

TY - JOUR

T1 - Own-Party Bias

T2 - How Voters Evaluate Electoral Outcomes

AU - Bækgaard, Martin

PY - 2023/7

Y1 - 2023/7

N2 - A voluminous literature documents that citizens' perceptions of democracy are shaped by electoral victories and defeats, but what reasoning do citizens use to evaluate parties as winners or losers? Drawing on research on partisan-motivated reasoning, I propose an own-party bias in winner-loser evaluations according to which voters evaluate the electoral fate of their party more favourably than that of other parties. Data gathered in the aftermath of the Danish parliamentary election in 2015 support this expectation. Citizens are more inclined to interpret the election outcome as successful for their preferred party, regardless of the actual election result. This is more pronounced the stronger their partisan attachment and among the less politically knowledgeable, who also assign less importance to objective indicators of electoral success. The findings have implications for our understanding of electoral winners and losers and of how electoral results shape party support and polarization.

AB - A voluminous literature documents that citizens' perceptions of democracy are shaped by electoral victories and defeats, but what reasoning do citizens use to evaluate parties as winners or losers? Drawing on research on partisan-motivated reasoning, I propose an own-party bias in winner-loser evaluations according to which voters evaluate the electoral fate of their party more favourably than that of other parties. Data gathered in the aftermath of the Danish parliamentary election in 2015 support this expectation. Citizens are more inclined to interpret the election outcome as successful for their preferred party, regardless of the actual election result. This is more pronounced the stronger their partisan attachment and among the less politically knowledgeable, who also assign less importance to objective indicators of electoral success. The findings have implications for our understanding of electoral winners and losers and of how electoral results shape party support and polarization.

KW - electoral outcomes

KW - partisan bias

KW - partisan-motivated reasoning

KW - political knowledge

KW - voter ignorance

KW - winner-loser gap

U2 - 10.1017/gov.2021.55

DO - 10.1017/gov.2021.55

M3 - Journal article

SN - 0017-257X

VL - 58

SP - 556

EP - 575

JO - Government and Opposition

JF - Government and Opposition

IS - 3

ER -