IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/arx/papers/2303.16422.html

Critical Thinking Via Storytelling: Theory and Social Media Experiment

Author

Listed:
  • Brian Jabarian
  • Elia Sartori

Abstract

In a stylized voting model, we establish that increasing the share of critical thinkers -- individuals who are aware of the ambivalent nature of a certain issue -- in the population increases the efficiency of surveys (elections) but might increase surveys' bias. In an incentivized online social media experiment on a representative US population (N = 706), we show that different digital storytelling formats -- different designs to present the same set of facts -- affect the intensity at which individuals become critical thinkers. Intermediate-length designs (Facebook posts) are most effective at triggering individuals into critical thinking. Individuals with a high need for cognition mostly drive the differential effects of the treatments.

Suggested Citation

  • Brian Jabarian & Elia Sartori, 2023. "Critical Thinking Via Storytelling: Theory and Social Media Experiment," Papers 2303.16422, arXiv.org.
    • Handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2303.16422
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://arxiv.org/pdf/2303.16422
    File Function: Latest version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. B. Douglas Bernheim & Luca Braghieri & Alejandro Martínez-Marquina & David Zuckerman, 2021. "A Theory of Chosen Preferences," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(2), pages 720-754, February.
    2. Timothy Feddersen & Wolfgang Pesendorfer, 1997. "Voting Behavior and Information Aggregation in Elections with Private Information," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 65(5), pages 1029-1058, September.
    3. John A. List, 2022. "Enhancing critical thinking skill formation: Getting fast thinkers to slow down," The Journal of Economic Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 53(1), pages 100-108, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Burkhard Schipper & Hee Yeul Woo, 2012. "Political Awareness and Microtargeting of Voters in Electoral Competition," Working Papers 124, University of California, Davis, Department of Economics.
    2. Robbett, Andrea & Matthews, Peter Hans, 2018. "Partisan bias and expressive voting," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 107-120.
    3. Meirowitz, Adam, 2005. "Deliberative Democracy or Market Democracy: Designing Institutions to Aggregate Preferences and Information," Papers 03-28-2005, Princeton University, Research Program in Political Economy.
    4. Bhattacharya, Sourav & Duffy, John & Kim, Sun-Tak, 2014. "Compulsory versus voluntary voting: An experimental study," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 111-131.
    5. Alastair Smith & Bruce Bueno de Mesquita & Tom LaGatta, 2017. "Group incentives and rational voting1," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 29(2), pages 299-326, April.
    6. Battaglini, Marco, 2005. "Sequential voting with abstention," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 445-463, May.
    7. Fernanda L L de Leon, 2013. "Adding Ideology to the Equation: New Predictions for Election Results under Compulsory Voting," University of East Anglia Applied and Financial Economics Working Paper Series 044, School of Economics, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK..
    8. Gordon Rausser & Leo Simon & Jinhua Zhao, 2015. "Rational exaggeration and counter-exaggeration in information aggregation games," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 59(1), pages 109-146, May.
    9. Kawamura, Kohei, 2008. "Communication for Public Goods," SIRE Discussion Papers 2008-25, Scottish Institute for Research in Economics (SIRE).
    10. Ginzburg, Boris, 2017. "Sincere voting in an electorate with heterogeneous preferences," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 154(C), pages 120-123.
    11. Susanne Goldluecke & Thomas Troeger, 2023. "The Multiple-Volunteers Principle for Assigning Unpleasant and Pleasant Tasks," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2023_464, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    12. Jo Thori Lind & Dominic Rohner, 2017. "Knowledge is Power: A Theory of Information, Income and Welfare Spending," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 84(336), pages 611-646, October.
    13. Dhillon, Amrita & Kotsialou, Grammateia & Xefteris, Dimitris, 2021. "Information Aggregation with Delegation of Votes," SocArXiv ubk7p, Center for Open Science.
    14. Xiong, Siyang, 2021. "Designing referenda: An economist's pessimistic perspective," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    15. Gerardi, Dino & McLean, Richard & Postlewaite, Andrew, 2009. "Aggregation of expert opinions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 65(2), pages 339-371, March.
    16. Casella, Alessandra, 2005. "Storable votes," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 391-419, May.
    17. Christopher Ellis & John Fender, 2016. "Information Aggregation, Growth, And Franchise Extension With Applications To Female Enfranchisement And Inequality," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 68(3), pages 239-267, April.
    18. Alan S. Blinder, 2009. "Making Monetary Policy by Committee," International Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(2), pages 171-194, August.
    19. Patrick Hummel & Brian Knight, 2015. "Sequential Or Simultaneous Elections? A Welfare Analysis," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 56(3), pages 851-887, August.
    20. Cécile Aubert & Huihui Ding, 2022. "Voter conformism and inefficient policies," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 59(1), pages 207-249, July.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2303.16422. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: arXiv administrators (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://arxiv.org/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.