Why do politicians and journalists tend to seek simplistic answers to issues, while political scientists tend to see issues with more complexity? Provide an example to illustrate these differences
What will be an ideal response?
An ideal response will:
1, Note that political scientists often see a world in which more than one factor contributes to an outcome. Thus, when trying to explain political outcomes, a political scientist is more likely to acknowledge a complex world with multiple contributing factors in a causal relationship. For example, a political scientist will not simply default to the simplest explanation, nor assume that a correlation between two events automatically means the existence of a causal relationship.
2, Discuss why politicians and journalists prefer simple explanations for political phenomena. For politicians and journalists, it is far easier, or politically beneficial, to simply explain events with a simple cause regardless of whether or not there is a causal relationship or other contributing factors. For politicians, explanations are often partisan in nature, ignoring information that does not comport with their political views.
3, Provide an example to illustrate these differences. For example, when trying to explain an election outcome, a political scientist might note a host of contributing factors that account for the election results—the state of the economy, incumbent advantages, public mood, or the quality of the campaigns. Pundits, journalists, and politicians may prefer simple explanations involving perhaps one of the above.
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