Ambiguity, Distorted Messages, and Nested Environmental Effects on Political Communication

Abstract

In this paper we are concerned with the clarity of political signals transmitted through political conversation and the accuracy with which those signals are perceived. The social communication of political information is subject to distortion effects that arise due to skewed expectations on the part of the receiver and ambiguous representations on the part of the sender. Indeed, communication that occurs between two citizens might be distorted either by characteristics of the individuals who are transmitting and receiving messages, or by characteristics of the setting in which the information is being transmitted. We argue that the power of majority opinion is magnified by the inferential devices that citizens use to reach judgments in the face of ambiguous political messages and hence the use of a personal experience heuristic gives rise to a political bias that favors the continued dominance of majority opinion. ow important is political communication among citizens? Political discussion is an efficient vehicle for becoming informed about politics (Downs 1957); it is a widespread activity with influential consequences (Berelson, Lazarsfeld, and McPhee 1954; Huckfeldt and Sprague 1995; Lazarsfeld, Berelson, and Gaudet 1944); and it may be fundamentally important to the vitality of democratic politics. At the same time, relatively few citizens demonstrate highly intense levels of political interest and engagement (Verba, Schlozman, and Brady 1995); politics is only one among many important topics competing for airtime during citizens' conversations (Huckfeldt and Sprague 1995); few of the com-This research was supported in part by grants from the National Science Foundation to Indiana University, Ohio State University, and the University of California, Irvine. We are especially grateful to John Sprague for his helpful advice and comments.

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