ABSTRACT
Empirical evidence demonstrates that the media impact of political scandals does not always determine election results. Even though, according to surveys, the general public appears to be preoccupied with corruption scandals, a considerable portion of voters tend to forget or forgive the inappropriate behavior of politicians when they cast their vote at the polls. In this chapter, we explore this inconsistency in attitude measurements, which tend to be based on the questions about one’s personal beliefs regarding corruption. Empirical evidence shows that the use (or abuse) of surveys to measure citizen’s perceptions of corruption leads to prejudiced inferences. Such interpretations are commonly proposed by global corruption watchdog organizations as well as by national and transnational public opinion research institutions. Our goal in this chapter is to evaluate the importance of measurements of implicit association as additional instruments for observing the effects of political scandals on public opinion.
