How does context influence individuals’ misinformation about socially marginalized groups? Scholarship has long found that one’s geographical and social environment are important determinants for one’s political attitudes. But how these contexts shape individuals’ levels of misinformation about stigmatized groups remains an open and pressing question, especially given the swift rise of misinformation in recent years. Using three original surveys, we find that individuals who report more contact with a diverse group of individuals were significantly less likely to be misinformed. These findings are particularly pronounced among white Americans. Moreover, contrary to the popular belief that where one lives is a strong determinant of racial attitudes, we also find that partisan and racial context did not meaningfully shape misinformation. These findings shed light on the factors that helps us to understand the misinformation that exists about this sizable share of U.S. society.

Does treatment mode matter in studies of the effects of candidate race or ethnicity on voting decisions? The assumption implicit in most such work is that such treatment mode differences are either small and/or theoretically well understood, so that the choice of how to signal the race of a candidate is largely one of convenience. But this assumption remains untested. Using a nationally representative sample of white voting-age citizens and a modified conjoint design, we evaluate whether signaling candidate ethnicity with ethnic labels and names results in different effects than signaling candidate ethnicity with ethnically identifiable photos and names. Our results provide strong evidence that treatment-mode effects are substantively large and statistically significant. Further, these treatment-mode effects are not consistent with extant theoretical accounts. These results highlight the need for additional theoretical and empirical work on race/ethnicity treatment-mode effects.

Laboratory studies frequently find that framing changes individual issue positions. But few real-world studies have demonstrated framing induced shifts in aggregate political opinions, let alone political identities. One explanation for these divergent findings is that the competitive nature of most real-world political debates presents multiple frames that cancel each other out. We assess this proposition and the extent of real-world framing by focusing on the issue of immigration, which has been framed in largely negative terms by the media. Specifically, we assess the connection between New York Times coverage of immigration and aggregate white partisanship over the last three decades. We find that negative framing on immigration is associated with shifts toward the Republican Party—the Party linked with anti-immigrant positions. This suggests that under the right circumstances, framing can alter core political predispositions and shape the partisan balance of power.