Participants rated the fictitious politician’s public approval & perceived character as higher if the politician was a member of their own political party than if the politician was a member of the another one

Judging scandal: Standards or bias in politics. Erin D. Solomon, Jana M. Hackathorn & David Crittendon. The Journal of Social Psychology, https://doi.org/10.1080/00224545.2018.1453468

ABSTRACT: As the number of political scandals rises, we examined the circumstances that might influence how a politician would be judged as a result of a scandal. Specifically, we hypothesized that ingroup bias theory and shifting standards theory would produce different patterns of judgements. In two studies, we found support for the ingroup bias theory, such that participants rated the fictitious politician’s public approval and perceived character as higher if the politician was a member of their own political party (i.e. their ingroup) than if the politician was a member of the another political party (i.e. their outgroup). These results may explain, in part, why people may judge politicians involved in scandal more or less harshly depending on whether they are an ingroup member or outgroup member.

KEYWORDS: infidelity, ingroup bias, political scandal, shifting standards, social identity theory

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Rolf Degen https://twitter.com/DegenRolf: A politician involved in a sex scandal is always judged more harshly if he/she is from the other side of the political aisle - no matter how people view sex outside marriage in general.