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By Andrew Stanton
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Ahead of the presidential debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, a leading expert on aging issued a warning about viewers' "confirmation bias."
Biden and Trump are set to face off in their first debate since 2020 in Atlanta, Georgia, on Thursday. The debate will be moderated by CNN, and will give each candidate an opportunity to set a contrast on key issues such as the economy, reproductive rights and foreign policy.
But political experts believe age will be in the spotlight during the debate, as both Biden and Trump have fielded concerns from some voters about their age. A February poll from ABC News and IPSOS found that 59 percent of voters believe both Biden, 81, and Trump, 78, are "too old" to be president, though medical experts have said both candidates remain fit to serve.
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The debate will give Biden and Trump an opportunity to quell concerns about their age to a likely audience of millions, as the race remains tight, according to recent polls.
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S. Jay Olshansky, a professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of Illinois Chicago and research associate at the university's Center on Aging, told Newsweek that many viewers may experience "confirmation bias" while watching the debate.
"People favoring Biden will interpret whatever former President Trump says as coming from someone that is not mentally fit for the presidency, regardless of what is said and how it is said. The same will happen among former President Trump supporters as they watch President Biden during the debates," he said.
The general public will not be able to "reliably gauge" either candidate's mental fitness based on the debate, and the only people capable of providing a medical assessment is their physician, he said.
"Viewers should not be expecting perfection from either candidate, as it is normal for anyone to make mistakes during a debate. Expectations that either candidate would put on a perfect debate performance "is when confirmation bias will come into play," according to Olshansky.
"Just imagine the pressure that both of them will experience during that debate. I speak publicly often, and among those of us that speak for a living, all of us make mistakes. We forget names, get dates wrong, sometimes use incorrect words – that's all part of public speaking," he said.
Newsweek reached out to the Biden and Trump campaigns for comment via email.
Ahead of Thursday, Biden has spent about a week engaged in debate preparations at Camp David as he hopes to use the debate to win over undecided independent voters who could sway the race in his favor in key swing states. Trump, meanwhile, has spent some of the week on the campaign trail, holding a rally in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, one of the states closely divided between Democrats and Republicans.
The debate comes as Biden has improved his standing in recent polls. FiveThirtyEight's polling aggregate showed the two candidates nearly tied on Wednesday, as Biden holds an advantage of 0.1 percent. One month earlier on May 26, Trump held a lead of 1.5 percentage points.
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