This study explores how first,and third-order beliefs influence the evaluation of political candidates, building on the framework by Correll et al. (2017). Using a factorial survey experiment, participants evaluated fictional political candidates across four conditions: (1) First-Order Beliefs, where participants provided personal evaluations; (2) Third-Order Beliefs, where participants predicted how the general population would evaluate candidates, incentivized for accuracy; (3) Conservative Context, where participants rated candidates based on how they believed conservative voters would evaluate them; and (4) Liberal Context, where ratings were aligned with perceived liberal voter preferences, both with monetary incentives for alignment. Candidate profiles varied in gender, age, experience, education, experience, and marital status.

A total of 504 participants, recruited in collaboration with the Laboratory of Experimental Economics at the University of Warsaw, completed the online study after filtering for attention checks. Preliminary findings suggest no significant gender bias when participants rated candidates based on personal beliefs or predicted general population preferences. In the conservative context, however, male candidates received slightly higher ratings, suggesting potential gender bias under ideological priming. In the liberal context, no significant gender bias was observed. Interactions between candidate gender, age, and marital status showed subtle but varying effects across conditions.These preliminary results highlight the nuanced role of contextual and belief-based factors in shaping political evaluations, particularly in ideologically charged settings.

This study contributes to understanding how belief systems influence gender perceptions in politics and offers a foundation for further exploration of these dynamics.