At What Cost? Reexamining Audience Costs in Realistic Settings

Abstract

Scholars have argued that leaders pay domestic audience costs for backing down from a prior position. We challenge this argument theoretically and methodologically. We argue that scholars have erred by measuring “costs” exclusively through disapproval of a leader’s handling of the situation when general job approval more accurately reflects audience cost theory. This distinction matters because Americans often have strong existing opinions of the president, such that situational disapproval does not damage general approval. We also argue that the use of hypothetical leaders compounds this problem. We test these assertions using two experiments. Our primary design examines approval for both a hypothetical president, as is common in the literature, and the then-sitting president, President Obama. Our secondary design allows us to alter the president’s partisanship. The results strongly support our theory, suggesting scholars have missed an important piece of the puzzle by focusing on situational approval for hypothetical leaders.