The Behavioral Science Behind Successful Political Messaging
With the US election only two months away and the Presidential debate less than two weeks away, the political arena is heating up.
The stakes are high and both (if not all) camps are undoubtedly harnessing every possible advantage to sway the electorate.
Which makes me wonder, what goes on behind the scenes? How do campaign teams craft messages that resonate deeply with voters? In my opinion, the answer must lie in the world of behavioral science.
Why do you ask? I will tell you. Any rational being will say that our political choices are made well.. rationally. That we make our voting decisions based on logic, our values and our standpoints on issues. But what if I told you that we are irrational beings? That we make our decisions quite irrationally, not because we want to but because of how our brains work.
How our brain makes decisions
We assume humans are rational beings who make rational decisions solely on logical analysis. However, this is not the case. Famous Nobel-Prize winning behavioral scientist Daniel Kahneman showed that humans are actually irrational beings who mostly make fast, automatic and intuitive decisions. Kahneman introduced system 1 and 2 thinking. This simply means that your brain has two modes of thinking.
System 1 is fast, automatic and intuitive. It is heavily influenced by emotions, immediate impressions and mental shortcuts (heuristics). It operates quickly and effortlessly and therefore is used for most of our decisions (est. 96 percent). While system 2 is a much slower and more deliberate mode of thinking. It involves conscious reasoning, critical thinking and logical analysis. It needs much more cognitive effort, is used for more complex decision-making and considers long-term consequences. Because it takes much more effort we only use this type of thinking for 4 percent (est.) of our decisions.
Since voters often do not have the time or get overloaded with information, we can assume that for most voters system 1 is primarily used to make voting decisions while system 2 is used to rationalize those decisions.
Three Behavioral Science Concepts That Impact Political Messaging
Below I will highlight a few interesting behavioral science concepts that are impactful in successful political messaging. This is not an exhaustive list as there are countless concepts and biases in the world of behavioral science. However, for the sake of brevity and readability, I will stick to 3 key concepts.
Strong slogans stick
Slogans are a powerful and often used tool in political campaigns. Strong slogans stick. We all remember former President Obama’s ‘Yes We Can’ slogan, and how it made us feel. The effectiveness of slogans is deeply rooted in behavioral science. For example, our brain loves simplicity. Remember system 1 thinking? When information is easy to process, it is more likely to be remembered and accepted, this concept is called cognitive ease.
Slogans are also meant to be used repeatedly, by being exposed to a phrase more often we are more likely to accept it or to find the sender to be likable. We call this effect the mere exposure effect. There are many more reasons why strong slogans stick, but for sake of brevity, since this is a blog after all, I will leave it at this.
Framing
One of the most powerful (and quite frankly interesting) tools in behavioral science is framing. Simply put this refers to how you ‘frame’ or present information. Whether you use a positive frame (gain framing) or a negative frame (loss framing) can significantly impact decision-making. In most cases, losses loom larger than gains. In other words, we perceive the loss of something as much greater than the gain of the exact same thing.
In the context of political messaging, it might be best (this is not advice) to emphasize the negative consequences of not implementing the candidates policies instead of the positive outcomes of implementing the candidates policies. It is important to note however that the context always matters so more research has to be done to draw any conclusions on specific situations.
Stories that captivate sell
As humans we are naturally drawn to stories that draw on emotions. Since we make most of our decisions based on emotions and intuition, we are more easily convinced by stories that evoke strong emotions than by numbers and facts. We call this strategy narrative persuasion.
In the context of political messaging, politicians might use stories, (personal) anecdotes or metaphors to convey their message as opposed to numbers and facts about their policies. They might tell a story about a family who cannot make ends meet or how they themselves defied the odds. By telling captivating stories that resonate, politicians make their political message more relatable, engaging, easy to understand and memorable and thereby influence voters decision-making.
Summary
In this blog we briefly explore three behavioral science concepts that impact successful political messaging. We started by understanding how we make decisions, followed by the application of the three concepts. By understanding these three concepts, readers can better appreciate the power of behavioral science in political messaging and voter decision-making.
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