Election campaigns and political knowledge about game and substance: Informed, uninformed or misinformed electorate?

Previous research has shown that electoral campaigns have cognitive effects on individuals, and contribute to an informed electorate. We make three contributions to this literature based on the Norwegian 2021 Election Campaign Study. First, the literature on media’s coverage of politics distinguish between a strategic game frame and issue frames, and shows that election coverage is dominated by game frames. Based on this distinction, we investigate how campaign learning differs between game knowledge and knowledge about issues. Second, we approach political knowledge as a two-dimensional concept, and investigate both factual knowledge and confidence in that knowledge. The latter dimension is crucial because confidence in knowledge inform political preferences. Third, we study factors that increase the learning effect of campaigns, addressing news consumption patterns as well as motivational and ability factors. The results show that voters are more knowledgeable about the political game than about issues. The mismatch between factual knowledge and confidence in knowledge is also greater for knowledge about issues. Moreover, while paying attention to the campaign is related to higher levels of knowledge and confidence, the relationship between motivational and ability factors and political knowledge is much stronger. Hence, the already interested and knowledgeable learn more, suggesting that campaigns contribute to upholding existing gaps in political knowledge.