Newswise — Liberals and conservatives are both biased, and to roughly the same degree, according to a new meta-analysis led by Peter Ditto, University of California, Irvine professor of psychological science.

The “bias” examined in the studies is akin to the hypocrisy that political partisans often complain about in their political adversaries: the tendency to judge identical policies and behaviors more charitably when enacted by one’s own political team than by the other.

 Researchers statistically combined the results of 51 previous experimental studies involving more than 18,000 participants. Each experiment evaluated people’s tendency to view information more or less favorably depending on whether it supported or challenged their political beliefs.

“Falling prey to partisan bias can lead to rigid thinking and a disinclination to change strongly held beliefs even in the face of overwhelming evidence,” Ditto warns. “This in turn can lead to a world in which politically opposed factions accept different sets of facts, eliminating the common ground needed to discuss difficult policy issues and to broker compromises.”

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