"How Do Voters Process Information? The Case of Criminal Politicians in India"
We study how voters process information through two experiments around Indian elections. In a large-scale experiment, we show that providing voters information about candidates’ criminal charges increases votes for clean candidates and reduces votes for criminal politicians, with larger penalties for candidates facing more and serious charges. A follow-up experiment replicates these results and identifies two mechanisms. First, information facilitates learning: voters form more accurate beliefs and evaluate criminal candidates less favorably. Second, using direct measures of voter attention, we show that information makes criminality more salient—especially when it is surprising or highlights contrast—and increases its weight in voting decisions. Our findings demonstrate that information can improve political selection in polarized environments by helping voters learn about, and drawing their attention to, valence qualities.
