Partisan bias in responses to sexual misconduct allegations against male politicians

Across two studies, we tested whether evaluations of sexual misconduct allegations against male politicians are made in a partisan biased manner. First, investigated the likelihood allegation by female staffer was perceived as legitimate Democratic and Republican participants when accused politician’s party affiliation aligned (versus unaligned) with participant’s own (Study 1). We also bias conditional on strength expressive partisanship 2). In Study 1, 182 159 affiliates (N = 341), recruited via Amazon Mechanical Turk, were randomly allocated to one three conditions (Democratic, Republican, or unaffiliated politician). Findings indicated that less likely than Democrats perceive legitimate, irrespective affiliation. Nonetheless, not more an unaligned politician their party. However, replication 1 larger sample (301 301 affiliates), Republicans (but Democrats) demonstrated judgements legitimacy allegations. Expressive did moderate this effect.