Ideologically motivated perception: The role of political context and active open-mindedness

In three experimental studies we investigate the role of contextual (i.e. issue politicization) and individual (i.e. active open-mindedness) factors, assuming that they influence the manner in which people of different political affinities perceive policy-relevant facts. We focus on political beliefs in the cultural domain, expecting that right-wing beliefs, compared to left-wing beliefs are associated with more inaccurate perceptions of facts (i.e. misperceptions) in ways that are politically congenial to right-wing ideology and official right-wing party narratives. We also argue that the level of accuracy in perceptions held by right-wingers (vs. lefts-wingers) is even lower when assessing highly-politicized (vs. less-politicalized) facts. Then, we postulate that assessments of highly-politicized facts are driven by political beliefs. In contrast, when assessing less-politicized facts, active open-mindedness modifies the relationship between ideology and accuracy assessment. The results of the study confirm the hypotheses proposed.