How do voters make decisions???

1
How do voters make decisions???
2
Campaigns in Voting Theories
Voters Role of Campaigns
Ignorant To manipulate


3
Campaigns in Voting Theories
Voters Role of Campaigns
Ignorant To manipulate
Bounded rationality

4
Campaigns in Voting Theories
Voters Role of Campaigns
Ignorant To manipulate
Bounded rationality To provide simple information to help people use shortcuts

5
Campaigns in Voting Theories
Voters Role of Campaigns
Ignorant To manipulate
Bounded rationality To provide simple information to help people use shortcuts
Highly socialized
6
Campaigns in Voting Theories
Voters Role of Campaigns
Ignorant To manipulate
Bounded rationality To provide simple information to help people use shortcuts
Highly socialized Meaningless?
7
Funnel of Causality

• Long term, stable partisan and policy
  predispositions
• Current policy preferences and perceptions of
  current conditions
• Retrospective evaluations of the president
  concerning results
• Impressions of the candidates personal qualities
• Prospective evaluations of the candidates and
  parties
• Vote choice

8
Sociological factors
9
Voting in 2008 by race
10
Percent of blacks who voted Democratic minus
percent of whites who voted Democratic
11
Gender

• In 1992
• Male 1 more D than R
• Female 16 more D than R
• In 2004
• Male 1 more D than R
• Female 11 more D than R
• Gender Gap in voting in 2008 11

12
Gender gap
13
Religion

• In 1992
• Committed mainline Protestant 17 more R than
  D
• Nominal mainline Protestant 10 more R
• Committed evangelical Protestant 3 more R
• Nominal evangelical Protestant 20 more D
• Committed Catholic 31 more D
• Nominal Catholic 28 more D
• Jewish 64 more D
• Non-religious 18 more D

14
Religious voting
15
Vote choice by degree of religious commitment
(white protestants)
16
Party identification

• A socialized, psychological attachment to a
  political party
• An information processing shortcut
• An information screen
• A predictor of vote choice

17
Party ID as predictor of vote choice for president
18
Strong partisans

• More likely to vote, be informed, and participate

19
Did you read a newspaper about the 2004
presidential election?
20
Did you vote in the 2004 presidential election?
21
Strong partisans

• More likely to vote, be informed, and participate
• Why?
• Better information processing
• Got somebody to root for

22
So how should a campaign activate strong
partisans?
23
What do we know about independents?
24
Independents

• There are fewer of them than partisans

25
Partisanship
26
Independents

• There are fewer of them than partisans
• Many who say they are independent actually lean
• Leaners are fairly reliable party voters
• Some other independents are clueless
• Only about 10 of voters are true political
  independents

27
Of the Independents
28
Percent of party identifiers voting for their
partys presidential candidate (Dems)
29
Percent of party identifiers voting for their
partys presidential candidate (Reeps)
30
Independents

• There are fewer of them than partisans
• Many who say they are independent actually lean
• Leaners are fairly reliable party voters
• True attitudinal independents less likely to be
  informed, vote, participate
• Behavioral independents / split ticketers do
  determine election outcomes

31
Behavioral independents, Dems
32
Behavioral independents, Reps
33
Other factors affecting vote choice
34
Funnel of Causality

• Long term, stable partisan and policy
  predispositions
• Current policy preferences and perceptions of
  current conditions
• Retrospective evaluations of the president
  concerning results
• Impressions of the candidates personal qualities
• Prospective evaluations of the candidates and
  parties
• Vote choice

35
Partisanship and approval of presidential job
performance
36
Retrospective evaluations of George W. Bush and
2008 vote choice
37
Who among these voters should a campaign focus
its energies on? Who should it ignore?