Release date: April 26, 2005
Contact: Deb Hammacher, Associate Director, University Media Relations,
at 404-727-0644 or deb.hammacher@emory.edu

Emory Profs Say Views of Economy Not Based on Fact

New research at Emory University--reinforced by the April 26 Gallup Poll--indicates that people's assessments of the current state of the economy have virtually no grounding in independent economic realities. On average, Republicans see the economic situation in terms of roses, Democrats as thorns and Independents somewhere in between.

Research just completed at Emory by Drew Westen, Alan Abramowitz and Mia Kelley in psychology and political science focused on how people made judgments about the economy in the presidential elections between 1980 and 2000. They found that people’s judgments about the state of the economy reflect some combination of leading economic indicators (e.g., GDP, unemployment), their personal financial situation (including how satisfied or anxious they are), and partisan feelings (seeing things as rosier when their party’s incumbent is in office).

"What is striking about the latest Gallup numbers, however, is that economic indicators seem irrelevant today to people’s judgments about the economy," says Westen. "There are other data showing a trend in this direction about partisanship influencing decision-making since 2000, but today's Gallup poll is showing that the normally powerful impact of partisan feelings in biasing political judgments is now almost total, with actual data providing nothing but a Rorschach inkblot on which partisans can project their wishes."

Westen feels that this likely reflects both the extreme polarization of the electorate today and the impact of cable, Internet and traditional media outlets that no longer strive for objectivity or make assertions of fact about politically charged issues such as the economy but instead either consistently slant the data in one direction or interject phrases like “critics charge” prior to presenting data that might inform the electorate.

Westen is available at 404-375-6639 or dwesten@emory.edu. Abramowitz is available at 404-727-0108 (w) or alan.abramowitz@emory.edu.

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