User:Hunerwithat/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
Political cognition - Wikipedia

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
As a student workings towards a political science degree, seeing how some of the fundamental areas of research in our field are presented is something I'm incredibly passionate about, making this specific page a crucial portion of the literature to explore. On a first impression level, while I'm aware that most people get their party identification from their parents, other elements of political cognition (in regards to how people take in news and other political opinions) is a subject I'm completely new to. This article does an excellent job in showcasing what some of the central research hypotheses have been in the literature surrounding cognition.

Evaluate the article
To begin, the lead section seems woefully underdeveloped considering the extent of the research it is presenting under the mantra of political cognition. More specifically, while it does bring up some of the areas of research in the form of "memory" and "attention", it doesn't mention the mechanism by which Political Cognition is being explored in the form of voting even though that makes up a substantial portion of the underlying article. From a content perspective, there is a fair share of literature that explores both the central tenants of Political Cognition and the opposition -- however, the opposition to the theories seem woefully underdeveloped. More specifically, the researchers responsible for refuting theories of voting behavior and ideology aren't given name recognition while their counterparts are, making their reification seem like an afterthought rather than an entirely new element of the literature. Images and other forms of visual media are also sincerely lacking, which might be incredibly useful for breaking down some of the more involved logical theories underlying the different elements of Political Theory. Furthermore, most of the sourcing used traces its roots back to the 1900's; while these papers are undeniably fundamental in laying out the groundwork for what we now understand about how people view politics, relying on them consistently without explanation for why there hasn't been any recent research is certainly a flaw with the article. In short, while nothing the article brings up seems out of place or unorganized, there is a significant degree of underdeveloped for the counter-theories to the hypotheses presented in what is currently understood about political cognition.