If voters are informed, why don’t they act like it?
In the first part of this series, I raised a question that sits at the centre of democratic life, that if people have access to information, why do their decisions so often contradict it?
A common response is to assume that people simply do not know enough. But this explanation is fast losing its hold on the mind and becoming increasingly difficult to defend. In Nigeria, as in many other countries, political information is not hidden. Every other day, reports are published, investigations circulate, and public debate is constant. People are not existing in a vacuum of knowledge.
And yet, this seemingly found awareness does not reliably produce better decisions.
This is where behavioural science becomes useful, not because it excuses poor choices, but because it explains why information alone is often insufficient.
The work of Daniel Kahneman provides a framework for understanding this gap. They assert that human thinking operates through two systems as follows:
- System 1 is fast, automatic, and intuitive. It responds to emotion, familiarity, and simple narratives. It allows us to make quick judgments without much effort.
- System 2, on the other hand, is slower, more deliberate, and analytical. It is responsible for evaluating evidence, weighing probabilities, and thinking through long-term consequences.
In theory, important decisions, such as choosing political leaders, should engage System 2. However, in practice, System 1 does most of the work. I will go ahead and make an admittedly broad generalisation that up to 95 per cent of voters decide who to vote for while on the polling queue, even at the point of casting their ballot.
This is not because people are careless, but because System 2 is cognitively demanding. It requires effort, time, and sustained attention, resources that are often in short supply in everyday life. So the mind defaults to what is easier.
And what is easier is not always what is accurate.
One of the most important insights from behavioural research is how people perceive risk.
Through what Kahneman and Amos Tversky called the availability heuristic, individuals tend to judge the likelihood of events based on how easily examples come to mind. Experiences that are vivid, recent, or emotionally charged feel more real than those described through statistics or projections. And this has serious implications for how people respond to political information.
As established in part I, a warning about inflation, for instance, is abstract. It exists as data, forecasts, or expert analysis. It requires interpretation. It does not immediately disrupt daily life, at least not at first.
But when prices begin to rise in the market, when transport fares increase, when household budgets tighten, the same issue becomes experiential. It is no longer information. It is reality.
And reality changes behaviour far more effectively than information ever could.
This helps explain a familiar pattern. However, there is also a deeper psychological layer at play.
Human beings are not naturally inclined to prioritise abstract, long-term outcomes over immediate, visible ones. When making decisions, people often rely on what feels concrete in the present: identity, trust, familiarity, or perceived short-term benefit.
This is partly why statements like “shey na statistics we go chop?” resonate so strongly. It captures a broader truth about human cognition: numbers, projections, and probabilities do not carry the same weight as lived experience. They are harder to feel, and therefore easier to dismiss.
From a purely analytical perspective, this may seem like a flaw. But from a cognitive standpoint, it is consistent with how the mind is designed to operate.
The consequence is a persistent gap between knowing and acting.
People can be aware and still make choices that do not reflect that awareness. Not because they are incapable of understanding the information, but because the information has not been processed in a way that drives behavioural change.
It remains abstract.
And abstraction, on its own, is rarely enough to compete with emotion, identity, or immediate incentives.
This brings us back to the balloon.
A balloon drifting in the air is surrounded by forces it cannot see. Heat, pressure, and the terrain below all shape its fate, but none of these are directly experienced until something happens. The information exists in the environment, but it does not alter the balloon’s movement. Only contact does. And this means the balloon keeps drifting, not because there is no information, but because the information has not become real.
It then raises a pertinent question: if information is readily available, and if experience is what ultimately drives behaviour, then what connects the two? What allows someone to look at information today and act as if the consequences have already been felt?
That missing link is where the problem becomes more interesting and more difficult to solve. But I will try to in part III.
