Can fact-checking ad watches keep political advertising honest?

What is it about?

Ad watches in local newspapers fact-check the claims of political ads. This study of eight U.S. Senate races found that the more ad watches there were of a race and the more ad watches that called out an ad, the more accurate the ads in that race were and the closer the ads' portrayals of their favored candidates tended to be to their actual position on the political spectrum, But the more ad watches there were in a race, the more extreme opponent portrayals in negative ads were.

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Why is it important?

While previous work looked at how ad watches affected voters, this is one of the first studies to suggest that ad watches may influence the conduct of political campaigns.