Countries around the world including the United States, Australia and countries across Europe have been confronting issues of increased numbers of refugees and migrants entering the country. Concerns have been raised by political parties across all of these countries about the numbers of refugees in particular that are seeking to enter the country, and how these concerns are communicated can influence acceptance of new arrivals by the broader population.
A study by Lalot, Quiamzade and Falomir-Pichastor (2019) investigated whether numerical anchoring, increasingly used by politicians, can influence the level of acceptance of new arrivals amongst the public.
An anchoring effect is a cognitive bias that occurs as a result of the tendency to be heavily influenced by the first piece of information that is provided (the ‘anchor’) when forming a judgment.1 In the case of migrant acceptance, anchoring involves stating or estimating the number of migrants to be accepted, which is likely to influence public opinion of what is an acceptable number.
Examples of the use of numerical anchoring provided included claims by German politicians that while Germany had agreed to accept 200,000 refugees per year, in 2015 a figure of one million refugees having entered Germany was purported. This was contrasted to zero refugees being accepted by Hungary, a country which had essentially closed its borders. Subsequently it has been argued that these figures are highly inflated with Germany taking in much less than a million refugees and Hungary actually likely to have taken many more than zero.2
The authors argue that research has shown that there is a tendency to be influenced by anchoring, and it is likely that the strategic use of numbers by political figures will influence public opinion on their position on accepting migrants.
The investigation
The authors undertook four studies, all with Swiss university students who completed a ‘short opinion survey’. In all studies an effect of numeral anchoring was anticipated.
Study 1 (N=167) sought to test the direct effect of the use of a numerical anchor on participants’ acceptance of migrants into the country. Participants were asked whether Switzerland should welcome more or fewer migrants and received one of three conditions: an anchor of 1,000, 100,000, or a control condition where no anchor was provided. Participants were asked to indicate the specific number that should be allowed entry.
Study 2 (N=128) sought to confirm the numerical anchor effect but included a manipulation of information provided that would reduce uncertainty for participants – adding ‘at least’ versus ‘a maximum of’ to the proposed number, with the authors hypothesising that this would influence the direction and extent to which participants would respond to the question of the number of migrants that should be accepted.
Study 3 (N=192) considered whether the participants’ political orientation (left wing or right wing) moderates the anchor effect. In this study two questions were added: one that allowed participants to rate their political orientation on a 7-point scale (1 = left-wing oriented/ 7= right-wing oriented) and a second that asked how much politics concerned them (7-point Likert type scale where 1= not at all/ 7 = very much). It was expected that there would be a main effect for anchoring as well as a main effect for political orientation with those being left wing allowing more migrants into the country.
Study 4 (N=114) aimed to add an element of real life to the activity by linking the numeral anchor to a political party, in this case the Socialist Party (left wing) versus the Swiss People’s Party (right wing) in a 2 (numeral anchoring: 1000 vs 100,000) x 2 (source: Socialist vs Swiss People’s Party) design. The researchers added a question about how participants perceived each of the parties to overcome any possible bias in preconceived perceptions of the parties. It was expected that the anchoring effect would be more pronounced where the source was in line with participant positioning with the parties than when not.
The findings
A strong anchor effect was found across all studies demonstrating that the number of migrants that people perceived as acceptable could easily be influenced by numerical anchoring. Study 3 indicated that participants tended to be left wing, confirmed in Study 4 where the Socialist party was perceived in a more positive light than the Swiss People’s Party, however, the results showed that the anchor effect was independent of the verbal direction of the anchor proposed (Study 2), perceptions of the political party as the source of the anchor and views of those parties (Study 4).
The upshot
Information provided to the public is important and can be used as a tool to influence public opinion on political matters. The authors of this paper argue that an extremely simple technique, such as the use of a numerical anchor, can have considerable influence on public opinion regardless of where their political inclinations lie. While this study investigates the use of numerical anchoring in perceptions of acceptable migrant numbers, it is argued that as a tool, anchoring could be used to influence any number of political agendas. Several limitations of the study are discussed.
doi.org/10.1111/jasp.12588
1 Turner, B. M., & Schley, D. R. (2016). The anchor integration model: A descriptive model of anchoring effects. Cognitive Psychology, 90, 1-47. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cogpsych.2016.07.003
2 A similar argument could be put about the political rhetoric here in Australia where the Government has argued that the Medevac legislation introduced in March 2019 would open the “floodgates” to refugees and asylum seekers using it to enter Australia when in reality reports indicate that to date it has been used nine times. See bit.ly/2Oq89QR