| Despite the public's uniformly dismal assessment of politicians' honesty, they react by punishing some offences and seemingly ignoring others. I use data from multiple survey experiments as well as an examination of electoral polling data to show that public reaction to accusations of deception against politicians is guided by the principle of expectancy violations. I find that when deception is expected, it does not draw cognitive focus from members of the public, thereby causing the public to punish only lies they find unusual. In this way, a reputation as a liar may produce a sort of inoculation effect: that is, the fact that a politician is often accused of lying may contribute to public tolerance of them continuing to do so. |
