“It Doesn’t Really Matter”

Ethan Porter and Thomas J. Wood argue that empirical studies show that when Americans of both parties are confronted with corrections to factual misstatements, they overwhelmingly change their opinion of the facts. This suggests good news, Porter and Wood write, that facts still matter. We are still living in a fact-based world. Porter and Wood are doing research that is important, not because there is not a crisis of factuality—it is the case that our political, corporate, and cultural leaders lie. Rather, the research is important because it shows that the real crisis of our times is not that the lies political and other elites tell are believed. It is that the lies, even when they are not believed, are accepted as permissible and even useful in the name of a political cause. 

That people accept facts as valid even when they know the facts to be false is one of the central insights of Hannah Arendt’s analysis of propaganda within totalitarian movements. We see a perfect example of this in President Trump’s tweet suggesting that his initial justification for the assassination of General Qassim Suleimani—apparently unsubstantiated—did not matter. The problem is not that facts are unknown; it is that for people whose very identity is caught up in a movement that gives their lives sense, the facts simply don’t matter. 

We also searched for, but failed to find, evidence showing that factual corrections alone cause people to change their political views. Those who believe empirical evidence should govern political attitudes might find this disappointing.

On the one hand, our evidence cuts against prior findings, including the original backfire paper. (To their enormous credit, the authors of that paper have worked with us in subsequent studies, including two that are discussed in our book.) Our work relies on far larger samples and tests a much wider variety of issues than previous investigations in this area. On the other hand, our work is part of an emerging consensus that concerns about “post-truth” politics could be overblown: Research now shows that fake news is much less prevalent than commonly feared, and other scholars on the hunt for the backfire effect have found results similar to ours.

Given all this, what explains the widespread belief in a “post-truth” world? We can think of several explanations. First, some of the purported anxiety about facts is likely standing in for anxiety about political disagreement. It is tempting to believe that your opponents are too irrational to reason with. (Tempting, but probably wrong.) Second, those who spread misinformation, including no shortage of today’s politicians, are often memorable. Psychologists have shown that the vividness of a particular case causes us to overestimate the frequency of that case. We can all easily call to mind a wild-eyed relative who traffics in conspiracy theories, but we tend to discount our relatives whose views are more grounded. Finally, there is some evidence that, at least on Twitter, lies spread more quickly than truths.