Nigel Farage is the latest in a long line of politicians to face questions about his financial affairs. Despite this, the Reform UK leader comfortably avoided a binning by his constituents in the Clacton byelection – albeit in the absence of the main parties.

This is perhaps unsurprising. The allegations against Farage include the claim (currently subject to a parliamentary standards investigation), that he should have declared a £5 million gift he received ahead of the 2024 general election. Farage has insisted that he has “done no wrongdoing” and that he “followed the rules”.

But a series of academic studies suggest that people tend to justify the behaviour of politicians they support rather than changing their vote to back someone else.

Only when scandals become too blatant and heavily covered for supporters to rationalise away do politicians tend to lose support. With this in mind, it’s perhaps not surprising that Farage won comfortably on home turf.

The effects of scandals on our political attitudes are difficult to study, in part because scandals are rare events. The fallout from any individual scandal could be specific to the politician involved, the time period in which it........

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