Political Science News

December 8, 2023

Top Headlines

Familiarity Breeds Contempt for Moral Failings

Oct. 17, 2023 — People judge members of their own circles more harshly than they judge individuals from other groups for the same transgressions, new research has ...

Naming and Shaming Can Be Effective to Get Countries to Act on Climate

Sep. 25, 2023 — Enforcement is one of the biggest challenges to international cooperation on mitigating climate change in the Paris Agreement. The agreement has no formal enforcement mechanism; instead, it is designed to be transparent so countries that fail to ...

How to Tackle the Global Deforestation Crisis

Sep. 20, 2023 — New research examines the 'revolution' in the study of deforestation brought about by satellites, and analyzing which kinds of policies might limit climate-altering ...

What the French Revolution Can Teach Us About Inflation

Sep. 18, 2023 — Study finds that politics, public expectations fuel ...

Latest Headlines

updated 11:12pm EST

Ultra-Processed Foods Largely Missing from US Food Policy

July 20, 2023 — A new study finds that only a small number of U.S. policies consider ultra-processed foods, lagging behind countries such as Belgium, Brazil, and ...

How an 'AI-Tocracy' Emerges

July 13, 2023 — Research finds 'AI-tocracy,' China's increased investments in AI-driven facial-recognition technology, both help the regime repress dissent and may drive the technology ...

Criticism With Care Is More Persuasive

July 10, 2023 — When unethical behavior is criticized, demands are often met with defensiveness and denial. How can we overcome this reaction? New research demonstrates that criticism is more persuasive when it is ...

Public Acceptance of Fossil Fuel Subsidy Removal Could Be Improved in Developing Countries

Mar. 21, 2023 — People might be more positive to the removal of fuel subsidies if told where the money would be spent instead. This has been shown in a study which ...

Study Offers Neurological Explanation for How Brains Bias Partisans Against New Information

Feb. 1, 2023 — People who share a political ideology have more similar 'neural fingerprints' of political words and process new information in similar ways, ...

U.S. Political Partisanship Affects First Impressions of Faces

Nov. 9, 2022 — In an experimental study, participants' first impressions of photos of strangers' faces were strongly influenced by disclosure of the stranger's political ...

Political Events Impact Sleep, New Research Suggests

Nov. 7, 2022 — Researchers show how major sociopolitical events can have global impacts on sleep that are associated with significant fluctuations in the public's collective mood, well-being, and alcohol ...

How to End COVID-19 as a Public Health Threat

Nov. 3, 2022 — A new global COVID-19 study provides actionable recommendations to end the public health threat without exacerbating socio-economic burdens or putting the most vulnerable at greater ...

Can Shifting Social Norms Help Mitigate Climate Change?

Oct. 13, 2022 — An interdisciplinary team of researchers reports on how social norms -- 'patterns of behaviors or values that depend on expectations about what others do and/or think should be done' -- can be ...

Why Some Countries Are Leading the Shift to Green Energy

Oct. 6, 2022 — A new study identifies the political factors that allow some countries to lead in adopting cleaner sources of energy while others lag behind. By analyzing how different countries responded to the ...

Earlier Headlines

Summaries
Headlines

Greater Gender Equality Helps Both Women and Men Live Longer

Mar. 6, 2023 — The first global study to investigate how gender equality may be associated with life expectancy has found that both women and men live longer as it ...

Pandemic Fatigue Fueled Political Mistrust and Conspiracy Beliefs Across Europe and the United States, Study Finds

Nov. 24, 2022 — In a new study, researchers find a significant societal impact of the pandemic beyond the domain of health and raise concerns about the ability of democratic societies to cope with future crises such ...

AI Tool Predicts When a Bank Should Be Bailed out

Nov. 17, 2022 — An artificial intelligence tool could help governments decide whether or not to bail out a bank in crisis by predicting if the intervention will save money for taxpayers in the long ...

Learning Science in a Hurry

Nov. 7, 2022 — With the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, people were plunged into a situation that required them to acquire information about an emerging scientific issue to assess the adequacy of government ...

Partisans Willing to Upend Democracy to Help Their Party Win Even When Polarization Is Diminished

Oct. 31, 2022 — There has long been an assumption that a connection exists between affective polarization and anti-democratic attitudes. A new study tests several depolarization interventions and finds that, while ...

New Study Shows How Voting Methods Affect Group Decision-Making

Oct. 27, 2022 — When groups of people need to reach a decision, they will often take a straw poll to test opinions before the official vote. New research shows that one specific voting method proved more effective ...

Empathizing With the Opposition May Make You More Politically Persuasive

Oct. 5, 2022 — Trying to understand people we disagree with can feel like a lost cause, particularly in contentious political environments. But new research finds that valuing empathy across party lines can make ...

Moral Values Explain Differences in COVID-19 Vaccination Rates Across US Counties

Sep. 15, 2022 — New research shows that moral values predict regional differences in COVID-19 vaccination rates beyond structural, demographic and political barriers to ...

COVID Face Masks Don't Impair Most Social Interaction, Study Suggests

Sep. 7, 2022 — A new study debunks the idea that wearing a mask to slow the spread of disease damages most everyday social ...

Voting in the 2020 Italian Constitutional Referendum Led to More COVID-19 Cases in Italy, Study Finds

Aug. 26, 2022 — Italian citizens who exercised their democratic right to vote in the 2020 constitutional referendum may have unintentionally contributed to the spread of COVID-19, finds a new study. However, ...

Fighting Climate Change Is Wildly Popular but Most Americans Don't Know That

Aug. 23, 2022 — Just after the U.S. Congress passed the nation's most substantial legislation aimed at battling climate change, a new study shows that the average American badly underestimates how much their ...

The Four Bases of Anti-Science Beliefs -- And What to Do About Them

July 11, 2022 — The same four factors that explain how people change their beliefs on a variety of issues can account for the recent rise in anti-science attitudes, a new review ...

Electric Vehicle Buyers Want Rebates, Not Tax Credits

July 7, 2022 — Financial incentives play an important role in the widespread adoption of electric vehicles. New research, however, finds that not all financial incentives are created equal in the eyes of ...

Growing 'Mortality Gap' Detected Between Democratic and Republican Counties

June 9, 2022 — Researchers examined mortality rates and federal and state election data for all counties in the U.S. from 2001 to 2019. The team found what they call a 'mortality gap' -- a widening ...

AI Ethical Decision Making: Is Society Ready?

June 3, 2022 — With the accelerating evolution of technology, artificial intelligence (AI) plays a growing role in decision-making processes. Humans are becoming increasingly dependent on algorithms to process ...

Brain Scans Remarkably Good at Predicting Political Ideology

June 2, 2022 — Brain scans of people taken while they performed various tasks -- and even did nothing -- accurately predicted whether they were politically conservative or liberal, according to the largest study of ...

New Studies Shed Light on Election-Related Stress

May 31, 2022 — A new study finds anticipating stress related to political elections can affect people's emotional well-being before anything has even happened. But a related study shows that education can help ...

Industry Lobbying on WHO Overshadowing Public Health Policy, Researchers Suggest

May 18, 2022 — A new article looks at how producers of such products as commercial milk formulas, processed foods, alcoholic beverages, pharmaceuticals and electronic gaming software have been ramping up efforts to ...

Lies That 'Might' Eventually Come True Seem Less Unethical

Apr. 14, 2022 — People may be willing to condone statements they know to be false and even spread misinformation on social media if they believe those statements could become true in the future, according to new ...

Show Them the Money: Pay the Vaccine-Hesitant to Get Their COVID-19 Shots

Apr. 13, 2022 — A study initiated before the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines has found that a $1000 incentive for the vaccine-hesitant could boost vaccine rates up to 87 percent. The study also speaks to how monetary ...

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