New study reveals “striking” political divide in who trusts their doctor

Trust in one’s personal doctor used to be politically neutral in the United States. But according to new research published in the British Journal of Political Science, that has changed. In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, Democrats have become significantly more likely than Republicans to trust their doctors and follow medical advice—even on issues unrelated to the pandemic. The study suggests that this growing partisan divide in health-related trust may have consequences for how Americans access and engage with medical care.

“During the COVID-19 crisis, I, like many others, watched as the medical community’s response to the pandemic—and various pandemic-related interventions—became interpreted through a partisan lens,” said study author Neil O’Brian, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Oregon and a 2024 Carnegie Fellow.

“I wondered whether the problem was deeper than just the pandemic: did people’s politics predict trust in their own personal doctor, and did this extend beyond COVID-related matters?”

While earlier research examined political divisions in health policy attitudes and pandemic behaviors, there was little evidence about whether someone’s political alignment shaped their feelings toward their individual healthcare provider. The authors set out to fill that gap.

To answer this question, the researchers analyzed public opinion data collected both before and after the pandemic. They used a nationally representative survey conducted in 2022 and compared it to earlier surveys from 2011, 2013, and 2019. These earlier surveys measured Americans’ trust in medicine as an institution, trust in their personal doctor, and how closely they followed their doctor’s advice. In addition to comparing these trends over time, the team ran several experiments to test whether political messaging could influence trust in doctors and whether people preferred doctors who shared their political beliefs.

The data showed that in 2013, trust in one’s personal doctor did not differ by political affiliation—if anything, Republicans were slightly more trusting. But by 2022, this pattern had reversed. Democrats were significantly more likely to say they had “a great deal” of trust in their personal doctor.

The same pattern appeared in adherence to doctors’ recommendations. Among Americans aged 50 and older, Democrats in 2022 were more likely than Republicans to say they followed their doctor’s advice “very closely” or “extremely closely.” The gap was especially wide between Biden and Trump voters. These shifts were not apparent in the early 2010s, suggesting the divide formed relatively recently.

The researchers also examined changes in public confidence in medicine as an institution. In 2019, there was no significant difference between Democrats and Republicans in their confidence in medicine. But by 2022, that changed sharply. Democrats were far more likely than Republicans to say they had “a great deal of confidence” in the medical profession.

This pattern echoed broader trends, as trust in many American institutions—including science, education, and the media—has become more divided by political identity over the past two decades. Medicine had largely avoided this trend until recently.

“One of the most striking findings is that confidence in medicine as an institution was non-partisan up until 2020,” O’Brian told PsyPost. “It was effectively the only institution that Democrats and Republicans had similar levels of confidence in by the end of the 2010s—while, for example, Democrats were already more trusting of science and education than Republicans, and Republicans were more trusting of the military or business than Democrats. The COVID crisis upset this bipartisan consensus.”

To better understand what might be causing the new divide in doctor-patient trust, the researchers considered several explanations. One possibility is that the makeup of the political parties changed. Over the past decade, more college-educated voters moved toward the Democratic Party, while the Republican base became more heavily non-college educated—a group that tends to express less trust in institutions.

While this shift explained some of the difference, it did not fully account for the partisan gap. When comparing people with similar backgrounds, partisanship remained a strong predictor of trust in one’s doctor.

“In a survey we conducted in 2022 of people 18 years and older living in the United States, whether someone reported trusting their own personal doctor—with the exceptions of age and having health insurance—was best predicted by whether they voted for Biden or Trump in 2020,” O’Brian explained. “This is striking: in our data at least, vote choice is a stronger predictor of trust in your personal doctor compared to things like education, race, or gender, which are commonly thought of as social determinants of trust and health.”

Another explanation is that COVID-19 may have changed how people viewed the political identity of doctors. Public figures like Dr. Anthony Fauci became symbols of the medical response to the pandemic, and they were frequently portrayed in partisan terms. Donald Trump publicly called Fauci “a Democrat,” and some Republican politicians criticized him for siding with Democratic governors.

The researchers hypothesized that this framing may have caused some Republicans to view the medical profession more generally as aligned with the Democratic Party.

To test this idea, the team ran an experiment in which some respondents were shown a news headline describing Fauci as a Democrat and a friend of a Democratic governor. They then measured participants’ trust in their doctor, their confidence in medicine, and their willingness to follow medical advice.

Among Trump voters, seeing this headline led to a drop in trust and confidence. Among Biden voters, the opposite was true—they expressed more trust and confidence after reading the headline. This pattern suggests that partisan framing of medical figures can affect how people feel about the profession as a whole, including their own personal doctor.

The researchers also explored whether people prefer doctors who share their political views. In another experiment, participants were shown profiles of two hypothetical doctors and asked which one they would prefer to visit. The doctors varied by characteristics such as gender, race, education, and political party.

The results showed that people tended to prefer doctors who shared their own political background, even when controlling for other factors. Democrats were more likely to choose a Democratic doctor, while Republicans were more likely to choose a Republican one. For many participants, partisanship mattered as much as—or more than—race or gender in deciding which doctor they would trust.

In a final study, the team tested whether people would be more or less interested in seeking care through online platforms that were either politically neutral or explicitly conservative. They found that liberals were more likely to engage with a politically neutral platform, while conservatives were more interested in a platform that highlighted conservative values. Again, the pattern was strongest among those who identified as strongly liberal or strongly conservative.

These findings suggest that people increasingly see their personal doctor through a political lens, and that this affects both who they choose to see and whether they follow medical advice. The implications are significant. Trust in doctors is linked to better health outcomes, including greater adherence to treatment plans, better management of chronic conditions, and improved self-reported health. If trust in doctors becomes filtered through political identity, these divides may affect the quality of care people receive and how they respond to it.

The researchers caution that while their findings show strong associations between political identity and trust in doctors, they cannot prove that political views directly cause changes in trust or health behavior. Other factors—such as media consumption, personal experience, or broader distrust in institutions—may play a role.

“There are always multiple things to consider in social science research,” O’Brian noted. “Whether these patterns will hold after the pandemic recedes from memory is one caveat and avenue for future research.”

“A primary goal of this research is to point out that politics predicts trust in doctors and medicine beyond COVID and vaccine-related matters. This is an important piece of knowledge, we think, for medical providers to know. We are also working on understanding if the political schism in trust creates a divide in health outcomes. If those on the left are more trusting and adherent to medical advice, does this lead to better health outcomes—such as lower blood pressure, lower prevalence of diabetes, and lower mortality?”

The study, “Partisanship and Trust in Personal Doctors: Causes and Consequences,” was authored by Neil A. O’Brian and Thomas Bradley Kent.