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Own-Party Bias: How Voters Evaluate Electoral Outcomes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 December 2021

Martin Baekgaard Open the ORCID record for Martin Baekgaard [Opens in a new window]
Martin Baekgaard*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark
*
*Corresponding author. Email: MartinB@ps.au.dk
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Abstract

A voluminous literature documents that citizens' perceptions of democracy are shaped by electoral victories and defeats, but what reasoning do citizens use to evaluate parties as winners or losers? Drawing on research on partisan-motivated reasoning, I propose an own-party bias in winner–loser evaluations according to which voters evaluate the electoral fate of their party more favourably than that of other parties. Data gathered in the aftermath of the Danish parliamentary election in 2015 support this expectation. Citizens are more inclined to interpret the election outcome as successful for their preferred party, regardless of the actual election result. This is more pronounced the stronger their partisan attachment and among the less politically knowledgeable, who also assign less importance to objective indicators of electoral success. The findings have implications for our understanding of electoral winners and losers and of how electoral results shape party support and polarization.

Keywords

electoral outcomeswinner–loser gappartisan biaspolitical knowledgevoter ignorancepartisan-motivated reasoning
Type
Article
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 58 , Issue 3 , July 2023 , pp. 556 - 575
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Government and Opposition Limited

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