Overview

In The Invented State, Emily Thorson argues that a problematic and understudied aspect of political misinformation reflects widespread public misperception about what the government does. Because much of public policy is invisible to the public, there is fertile ground for false beliefs to flourish, leading to what Thorson terms the ""invented state"" systematic misperceptions about public policy. However, people get the facts wrong not because they are stupid or blinded by partisan loyalty. Misperceptions are created when three conditions are met: when citizens have incomplete information about an issue, when their own biases color their understanding of it, and when they feel that the issue is important. The invented state is created by exposure to misinformation and by individuals' cognitive errors. Correcting these policy misperceptions is highly effective at reducing false beliefs. Providing people with corrective information has downstream effects on attitudes. When they learn how policies really work, their approval increases and they also shift their policy priorities. Contrary to pundits' assumptions of a public who is largely indifferent to policy, there is a deep public desire to learn basic facts about how the government works. Thorson meets that desire with analysis on how the media can identify and correct substantive policy misperceptions.

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Emily Thorson is an assistant professor of political science at Syracuse University. Her research focuses on how people learn about the political world. She is particularly interested in understanding what people get wrong about politics and policy, and how correcting these misperceptions changes their attitudes and behavior. She received a dual PhD in communications and political science at the Annenberg School and at the Department of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania. Emily Durante has been narrating audiobooks for over ten years and is also an AudioFile Earphones Award-winning audiobook director. She has been acting since the age of seven and has performed in a number of stage productions at the professional, collegiate, and regional levels.

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