POLSCI 101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 9: Political Action Committee, Multiple Choice, Social Mobility
Document Summary
When people were asked who senators were, they couldn"t tell, when asked to name scotus, they couldn"t tell you. In the 1950s to 70s, political scientists were pretty convinced that most of us couldn"t pass a civic exam and we were going to fail civics exam. What we should be able to do is to get useful political information. We get useful information by picking up cues from many different media sources. Form organizations we belong to like churches and labor unions. The idea that people can learn enough that their political knowledge is good enough to be based on cues is called heuristics. How they react tells you where you stand. You are looking for information that comes filtered to you from an advocacy position. Maybe you like to side with your family or not. You can go to certain websites with certain political views. The simplest place to get views is from political parties.
