The sophisticated public: The effect of competing frames on public opinion

Deliberation is the current buzzword among democratic thinkers. Deliberative democracy assumes that deliberation has an effect on the people engaging in the deliberative process. Several studies have demonstrated that this is indeed the case: deliberation increases political knowledge and opinion consistency, as well as mutual understanding and broader tolerance among citizens. In order to verify the findings from these studies and to confront the problems of internal and external validity in the previous studies of deliberation, alternative methodological designs must be applied. Applying an experimental split-sample design using CATI on the Danish electorate reveals how arguments and frames influence public opinion. Across various frames and arguments and political issues, positive (negative) arguments tend to push opinions in a positive (negative) direction. When competing frames are presented to the public, people submit to neither ambivalence nor non-attitudes. Quite to the contrary, people tend to follow their predisposition and provide more consistent opinions. Thus, deliberation composed of various competing frames and arguments facilitates - rather than distorts - sophisticated and considered public opinion.