Study: Conservatives Don’t Get Colbert

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A new study purports to show that conservatives don’t get that Steven Colbert is joking:

This study investigated biased message processing of political satire in The Colbert Report and the influence of political ideology on perceptions of Stephen Colbert. Results indicate that political ideology influences biased processing of ambiguous political messages and source in late-night comedy. Using data from an experiment (N = 332), we found that individual-level political ideology significantly predicted perceptions of Colbert’s political ideology. Additionally, there was no significant difference between the groups in thinking Colbert was funny, but conservatives were more likely to report that Colbert only pretends to be joking and genuinely meant what he said while liberals were more likely to report that Colbert used satire and was not serious when offering political statements. Conservatism also significantly predicted perceptions that Colbert disliked liberalism. Finally, a post hoc analysis revealed that perceptions of Colbert’s political opinions fully mediated the relationship between political ideology and individual-level opinion.

I’ll admit I’m somewhat a victim of this. Being of a libertarian persuasion, I’ve often convinced myself that Colbert wouldn’t be making certain jokes — or be so able to pull off his persona — if at some level he didn’t believe something at least in the neighborhood of what his character believes. Though, obviously a much more sane version of said beliefs.

Of course, that said “sane” version is just pretty much… what I believe. Leading me to believe my own perception here must be projection. Either way, if it hasn’t already been, when do you predict this study will show up on his show as an object of mockery?

HT: Sullivan