Survey_FFPZ_2021

Abstract

Two survey experiments (fielded in May 2020, with a total of over 4,000 respondents) designed to study how motivated beliefs affect information selection and processing during the COVID-19 pandemic. The first survey was tailored to shed light on how people select the type of news they consume (in terms of optimistic or pessimistic tone) and examine belief updating when agents randomly receive information they did or did not select. The second survey aims at testing the exacerbation of confirmatory biases when news are channeled through sources that are generally aligned with, or opposed to, the respondent's political orientation.