| What do Americans know about politics? Why do some Americans know more about politics than others? Can people become more knowledgeable about politics? With the advent and rise of the behavioral revolution and national survey research centers answering these questions became the focus of many political behavior studies. Despite the impressive number of studies that have accumulated over time, the political sophistication field remains mired by conceptual and methodological problems. In addition, because few surveys include questions directly assessing the public's level of political knowledge most studies in this field rely on cross-sectional data. The result is a static picture of the electorate. This study puts forth a dynamic theory of political knowledge, which fuses Neuman's (1986) theory of three publics with recent studies by Luskin (1990) and Delli Carpini and Keeter (1996) who argue that the determinants of political information are multidimensional or endogenous to a person's ability, motive and opportunity to collect political information. This theory joins two related areas in the political sophistication literature that are usually presented as unique and distinct. The purpose is to develop a theory of political knowledge that is simple, general and dynamic. While past research has uncovered a largely uninformed or unsophisticated public, this work shows that the acquisition of political knowledge is dynamic. Thus, by no means are low levels of political knowledge among the mass public unchanging. Although most researchers agree that both nature (ability) and nurture (political environment and motive) play a role in determining varying levels of political knowledge, I argue that the relative importance of each of these factors will vary depending on whether people fall into the elite, mass or apolitical public. Four hypotheses are derived from the theory and tested using survey data from the American National Elections Studies (ANES) from 1970 to 1996. In addition to the general theory, I also explore the role strong ties to a descriptive group plays in fostering either specialized or general political knowledge. The theory proposed in this chapter is tested using data from the Latino National Political Survey (LNPS). |
