NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION Research Paper THE EFFECTS OF FACT-CHECKING THREAT Results from a field experiment in the states Brendan Nyhan and Jason Reifler* October 2013 Executive summary Politicians in the United States are coming under increasing scrutiny from fact-checkers like PolitiFact, Factcheck.org, and the Washington Post Fact Checker, who examine the accuracy of public statements that are often reported without challenge by traditional news organizations. However, we know little about the effects of this practice, especially on public officials. One possibility is that fact-checking might help to deter the dissemination of misinformation, especially for candidates and legislators at lower levels of government who receive relatively little scrutiny and are sensitive to potential threats to re-election. To test this hypothesis, we conducted a field experiment during the 2012 campaign evaluating the effects of reminding state legislators about the electoral and reputational threat posed by fact-checking. Our experimental sample consisted of nearly 1200 legislators in nine states with state PolitiFact affiliates. We found that legislators who were sent reminders that they are vulnerable to fact-checking were less likely to receive a negative PolitiFact rating or have the accuracy of their statements questioned publicly than legislators who were not sent reminders. These results suggest that the electoral and reputational threat posed by fact-checking can affect the behavior of elected officials. In this way, fact-checking could play an important role in improving political discourse and strengthening democratic accountability. * Brendan Nyhan ([email protected]) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Government at Dartmouth College. Jason Reifler ([email protected]) is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics at the University of Exeter. They contributed equally to this report, which summarizes the results of a field experiment conducted in fall 2012 with the support of The Democracy Fund and the New America Foundation’s Media Policy Initiative. See the academic working paper for more details on the methodology and statistical results: http://www.dartmouth.edu/~nyhan/fact-checking-elites.pdf. Introduction Previous research suggests that elected officials tend to be risk-averse and In the United States, organizations like concerned about threats to re-election, PolitiFact, Factcheck.org, and the including critical media coverage. Washington Post Fact Checker are bringing new scrutiny to the statements To test this hypothesis, we conducted a made by public officials. Too often, field experiment (an experiment conducted traditional news organizations report what in a real-world setting rather than the public officials say without evaluating the laboratory) to evaluate the effects of being accuracy of their statements or attempting reminded about the threat posed by fact- to arbitrate between competing factual checking. Specifically, our study compared claims, which allows elites to make the behavior of a group of state legislators misleading comments in the press without who were sent letters warning of the challenge. By contrast, fact-checkers reputational and electoral threats from carefully scrutinize the claims made by fact-checking with a comparable control candidates and elected officials and weigh group of legislators. This experimental them against the available evidence. design allows us to make credible causal inferences about the effects of these This sort of journalistic fact-checking has reminders on legislators’ behavior. become much more common in recent years, but we know very little about the The results of our experiment indicate that effects of this expansion.1 One possibility is politicians who were sent reminders that that fact-checking helps members of the they are vulnerable to fact-checking were public become better informed, but people less likely to receive a negative PolitiFact often avoid or reject unwelcome rating or have the accuracy of their information about politics. As a result, it is statements questioned publicly. These often difficult to correct misperceptions findings, which we describe further below, about controversial issues.2 suggest that fact-checking can play an important role in improving political Fact-checking might have other benefits, discourse and increasing democratic however. In particular, it might help to accountability. deter the dissemination of misinformation, particularly among candidates and legislators below the presidential level. Methods and measures Politicians may avoid making inaccurate claims that would attract the attention of In our field experiment, a total of 1169 fact-checkers to prevent damage to their state legislators in Florida, New Jersey, electoral prospects or political reputation. Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, Texas, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin were NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION PAGE | 2 randomly assigned to one of three groups. of participants’ awareness that they were The treatment group (n=392) was sent a being studied.3 series of letters between August 23 and Finally, legislators in the control condition October 12, 2012 alerting them to the (n=391) were not sent any mailings or potential consequences of being caught contacted in any way. making incorrect statements by fact- checkers. The treatment mailings to We examined the effects of our letters on legislators had several key elements. First, the behavior of state legislators in our we reminded the legislators that there was sample using two outcome measures for a PolitiFact affiliate in their state to the study period (August 24-November 6, establish the credibility of the threat that 2012). First, did the legislator in question they could be fact-checked. Second, we receive a PolitiFact rating of Half True or highlighted the potential electoral and worse? If our treatment letter was reputational consequences of negative fact- successful in encouraging legislators to be check ratings by asking questions like “Do more careful, then we should expect this election campaigns use ‘false’ or ‘pants of group, on average, to have better ratings fire’ verdicts in their advertising to attack from PolitiFact. Our second outcome their opponents?” and “Will state measure measured whether the accuracy of legislators lose their seats as a result of a claim made by the legislator was fact-checkers revealing that they made a questioned in one or more articles or blog false statement?” Finally, we included two posts appearing in the Lexis/Nexis news examples of PolitiFact “pants on fire” fact- database during the study period. Again, checks from another state as examples. these sorts of questions should be raised less frequently if the treatment letter had Another group of legislators were the intended effect. Finally, we combine randomly assigned to what is known as a these measures into a composite indicator n placebo condition ( =386). These of whether the legislator received a legislators were sent a series of letters negative PolitiFact rating or had the during the same period noting that we accuracy of a claim questioned publicly.4 were conducting a study evaluating the accuracy of politicians’ statements that excluded any language about fact-checking Results or the consequences of inaccurate Before we turn to the results of our statements. We included this additional experiment, it is worth noting just how rare condition to make sure that any effects of it is for state legislators to be fact-checked. the treatment mailing were not the result Among the 1169 legislators in our sample, only 23 received ratings from PolitiFact NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION PAGE | 3 state affiliates (2.0%). In particular, the While it is not possible to examine the distribution of state legislator fact-checks accuracy of the statements that were not varied substantially across states. Figure 1 rated directly, we can examine the presents the number of legislators who distribution of ratings across the 27 received one or more fact-checks by state. PolitiFact fact-checks of state legislators in The states that were the most competitive our sample during the study period (one in the presidential race (Florida, Ohio, and legislator was rated five times). Virginia) did not publish any fact-checks of As Figure 2 indicates, 19 of the 27 state legislators during this period, statements checked were rated Half True suggesting that the ad wars being waged in or worse (70%), suggesting that the ratings the states by the Obama and Romney that were published were relatively campaigns diverted the focus of fact- negative. checkers away from lower-level officials. PolitiFact fact−checks of state legislators Total legislators fact−checked (8/24/12−11/6/12) 10 5 0 FL NJ OH OR RI TN TX VA WI Figure 1: Very few state legislator fact-checks were published during the campaign. NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION PAGE | 4 PolitiFact fact−checks of state legislators Distribution of ratings (8/24/12−11/6/12) 10 5 0 T MT HT MF F POF States: FL, NJ, OH, OR, RI, TX, TN, VA, WI Figure 2: State legislators tended to receive relatively negative ratings. Most notably, however, we find striking who were not assigned to the treatment differences in indicators of accuracy group had the accuracy of their statements between legislators who were sent questioned publicly in content indexed in treatment letters about the electoral and LexisNexis (1.0%) compared with one in the reputational threats from fact-checkers and treatment group (0.3%) — a relative risk those sent placebo letters or no mail at all. reduction of 75%. To maximize statistical As Table 1 shows, thirteen legislators who power, we combine these measures. Figure were not sent reminder letters about fact- 3 illustrates the differences between checking received a negative rating from conditions for the combined measure, PolitiFact (1.7%) compared with only three which are statistically significant (p<.05). legislators in the treatment group (0.8%). The rate of accuracy criticism decreased This difference represents a 55% reduction from 2.7% among those not sent reminder in the relative risk of receiving a negative letters to 1.0% in the treatment group, a PolitiFact rating.