How Deeply Held Are Anti-American Attitudes Among Pakistani Youth? Evidence Using Experimental Variation in Information

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in AbstractThis paper investigates how attitudes toward the United States are affected by the provision of information. We use an experimentally generated panel of attitudes, obtained by providing urban Pakistanis with fact-based statements describing the United States in either a positive or negative light. Anti-American sentiment is high and heterogenous in our sample at the baseline. We fi nd that revised attitudes are, on average, signifi cantly different from baseline attitudes, indicating that providing information had a meaningful effect on U.S. favorability. Observed revisions are a consequence of both the salience of already known information and information acquisition that leads to a convergence in attitudes across respondents with different priors. This analysis provides evidence that (i) public opinions are not purely a cultural phenomenon and are malleable, and (ii) the tendency of respondents to ignore information not aligned with their priors can be overcome. Our fi ndings make the case for dissemination of accurate information about various aspects of the Pakistan-U.S. relationship in order to improve opinion toward the United States.

Trust in State and Nonstate Actors: Evidence from Dispute Resolution in Pakistan

“…Another branch of the literature related to our work investigates various dimensions of extremism. For example, Bullock et al (2011) and Blair et al (2013) look at support for militant groups in Pakistan, while Delavande and Zafar (2012) and Bursztyn et al (2016) focus on anti-American attitudes. There is also a literature using lab-in-the-field games in development economics (see the survey by Cardenas and Carpenter 2008).…”

Political Identity: Experimental Evidence on Anti-Americanism in Pakistan

“…Beath et al (2012) study the impact of foreign aid on Afghans' views on security and on the Afghan government, NGO's and foreign military forces. Delavande and Zafar (2012) experimentally analyze how Pakistanis' attitudes towards the U.S. are affected by provision of information about the U.S. Outside of South Asia, Corstange (2014) finds that foreign sponsorship of a survey systematically affects response rates in Lebanon. See Gentzkow and Shapiro (2004) for an overview of anti-Americanism in the Islamic world.…”

Identifying Ideology: Experimental Evidence on Anti-Americanism in Pakistan

“…Beath et al (2012) study the impact of foreign aid on Afghans' views on security and on the Afghan government, NGO's and foreign military forces. Delavande and Zafar (2012) experimentally analyze how Pakistanis' attitudes towards the U.S. are affected by provision of information about the U.S. Outside of South Asia, Corstange (2014) finds that foreign sponsorship of a survey systematically affects response rates in Lebanon. See Gentzkow and Shapiro (2004) for an overview of anti-Americanism in the Islamic world.…”