Partier
Somebody versus nobody: An exploration of the role of celebrity status in an election
Lara Zwarun & Angela Torrey
Social Science Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
This study examines the role celebrity status may play in potential voters' evaluation of a political candidate presented in a newspaper article. Participants indicated greater intention to vote for a candidate who was a recognizable Hollywood actor than an unknown candidate in a political race, regardless of how substantive the political information provided about the candidate was. This suggests that familiarity with a celebrity can act as a heuristic in peripheral processing. Younger people were more likely to vote for a celebrity candidate than older voters, but how liberal or conservative participants are was not a significant factor in the decision to vote for the celebrity. Nor did participants' need for cognition or level of political involvement predict intention to vote for the celebrity, suggesting that celebrity status is meaningful to motivated and thoughtful voters as well as those who are less motivated and informed. The possibility is raised that this could be an indication of celebrity status being used as a component of deliberate political decision-making, and future research in this direction is suggested.
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Christian Kandler, Wiebke Bleidorn & Rainer Riemann
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
In this study, we used an extended twin family design to investigate the influences of genetic and cultural transmission as well as different sources of nonrandom mating on 2 core aspects of political orientation: acceptance of inequality and rejecting system change. In addition, we studied the sources of phenotypic links between Big Five personality traits and political beliefs using self- and other reports. Data of 1,992 individuals (224 monozygotic and 166 dizygotic twin pairs, 92 unmatched twins, 530 spouses of twins, 268 fathers, and 322 mothers) were analyzed. Genetically informative analyses showed that political attitudes are genetically but not environmentally transmitted from parents to offspring and that a substantial proportion of this genetic variance can be accounted for by genetic variance in personality traits. Beyond genetic effects and genotypic assortative mating, generation-specific environmental sources act to increase twins' and spouses' resemblance in political beliefs. The results suggest multiple sources of political orientations in a modern democracy.
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Disgust Sensitivity and the Neurophysiology of Left-Right Political Orientations
Kevin Smith et al.
PLoS ONE, October 2011, e25552
Abstract:
Disgust has been described as the most primitive and central of emotions.
Thus, it is not surprising that it shapes behaviors in a variety of organisms and in a variety of contexts - including homo sapien politics. People who believe they would be bothered by a range of hypothetical disgusting situations display an increased likelihood of displaying right-of-center rather than left-of-center political orientations. Given its primal nature and essential value in avoiding pathogens disgust likely has an effect even without registering in conscious beliefs. In this article, we demonstrate that individuals with marked involuntary physiological responses to disgusting images, such as of a man eating a large mouthful of writhing worms, are more likely to self-identify as conservative and, especially, to oppose gay marriage than are individuals with more muted physiological responses to the same images. This relationship holds even when controlling for the degree to which respondents believe themselves to be disgust sensitive and suggests that people's physiological predispositions help to shape their political orientations.
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Can friendships be bipartisan? The effects of political ideology on peer relationships
Paul Poteat et al.
Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, November 2011, Pages 819-834
Abstract:
Although political ideology has been examined extensively as a predictor of individual differences, it has been absent in the interpersonal relationships literature. Political ideology may have strong effects on friendship patterns because of its polarizing nature. Findings among actual friendship groups (Study 1) indicated a degree of similarity in peers' political ideology alignments, but also suggested that liberals and conservatives were comfortable with some level of bipartisanship among their friends. In an experimental condition with hypothetical peers (Study 2), individuals' political ideology predicted their reported friendship potential (perceived similarity and desire for friendship) with gay-affirming and gay-disapproving peers whose ideologies were not explicitly indicated. This effect of political ideology on friendship potential was significant over and above the effect predicted by individuals' similarity or dissimilarity on sexual minority attitudes with these peers. Findings highlight the overarching relevance of political ideology as a factor that contributes to friendship patterns.
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The Origins & Meaning of Liberal/Conservative Self-Identifications Revisited
Simon Zschirnt
Political Behavior, December 2011, Pages 685-701
Abstract:
This paper examines the permanence of differences in the psychological underpinnings of ideological self-identifications. Previous research has suggested that conservatives differ from liberals insofar as their self-identifications as such are best explained as the product of a negative reaction (both to liberalism generally and to the groups associated with it in particular) rather than a positive embrace. However, this paper demonstrates that the dynamics underlying the formation of ideological self-identifications are not static reflections of inherent differences in liberal and conservative psychologies but rather evolve in response to changes in the political environment. Whereas feelings (positive or negative) toward liberalism played a decisive role in shaping individuals' ideological self-identifications during the New Deal/Great Society era of liberal and Democratic political hegemony, the subsequent resurgence of political conservatism produced a decisive shift in the bases of liberal and conservative self-identifications. In particular, just as conservative self-identifications once primarily represented a reaction against liberalism and its associated symbols, hostility toward conservatism and its associated symbols has in recent years become an increasingly important source of liberal self-identifications.
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Are Financial or Moral Scandals Worse? It Depends
David Doherty, Conor Dowling & Michael Miller
PS: Political Science & Politics, October 2011, Pages 749-757
Abstract:
Previous analysis finds that people respond differently to "financial" (e.g., tax evasion) and "moral" (e.g., sexual misconduct) political scandals. However, experimental and observational studies tend to reach different conclusions about which type of scandal induces a stronger negative reaction from the public. We use an experiment embedded in a national survey to examine the possibility that these divergent findings can, in part, be explained by a failure to consider the effects of abuses of power. Consistent with previous experimental work, we find that people respond more negatively to financial scandals than to moral scandals when they do not involve abuses of power. However, abuses of power substantially affect responses to both types of scandals. We also find that moral and financial scandals affect personal and job evaluations of a politician differently. These findings support our contention that to understand public responses to scandal, it is crucial to consider the relationship between the scandalous behavior and the official's formal responsibilities.
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Talia Bar & Asaf Zussman
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
We study grading outcomes associated with professors in an elite university in the United States who were identified -- using voter registration records from the county where the university is located -- as either Republicans or Democrats. The evidence suggests that student grades are linked to the political orientation of professors: relative to their Democratic colleagues, Republican professors are associated with a less egalitarian distribution of grades and with lower grades awarded to Black students relative to Whites.
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Do bedroom eyes wear political glasses? The role of politics in human mate attraction
Casey Klofstad, Rose McDermott & Peter Hatemi
Evolution and Human Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
Most social science research portrays attitudes and behaviors as a product of one's environment or social upbringing. Recently, however, scholars have begun to expand upon this paradigm by showing that biological factors such as genes, which are passed from parents to offspring, can also help explain differences in political attitudes and behaviors. As a result, illuminating how spouses select one another is the first step toward understanding both the genetic and social transmission of political preferences from parents to offspring. Yet the question of whether individuals actively seek out mates who are more politically similar is unknown. To address this lacuna, data were gathered from Internet dating profiles. These data show that most individuals are reluctant to advertise politics when attempting to attract a mate. However, the correlates of political attitudes and behavior, such as education and civic engagement, do predict whether a person uses politics as a way to attract a mate. Thus, although spouses share such predilections more than almost any other trait, individuals do not appear to initially select potential dates along political lines.
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The Roots of the Gender Gap in Political Knowledge in Adolescence
Jennifer Wolak & Michael McDevitt
Political Behavior, September 2011, Pages 505-533
Abstract:
Why do men score better than women do on tests of political knowledge? We consider the roots of the gender gap in political knowledge in late adolescence. Using a panel survey of high school seniors, we consider the differences between young men and young women in what they know about politics and how they learn over the course of a midterm election campaign. We find that even after controlling for differences in dispositions like political interest and efficacy, young women are still significantly less politically knowledgeable than young men. While campaigns neither widen nor close the gender gap in political knowledge, we find important gender differences in how young people respond to the campaign environment. While partisan conflict is more likely to promote learning among young men, young women are more likely to gain information in environments marked by consensus rather than conflict.
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Heather Ondercin & Daniel Jones-White
Social Science Quarterly, September 2011, Pages 675-694
Objective: We explore whether observed sex-based differences in political knowledge have an impact on men's and women's participation in six different political activities.
Methods: Utilizing ANES data from the five presidential elections between 1984 and 2000, we employ logistic regression to estimate the likelihood of voting, influencing a vote, attending a political meeting, working on a political campaign, wearing a political button, and making a campaign donation.
Results: At lower levels of political knowledge, women's lower political knowledge depresses their participation in politics. The participation gap disappears at higher levels of political knowledge for three participatory
acts: attempting to influence a vote, attending a political meeting, and donating to a political campaign. Furthermore, at higher levels of political knowledge, women are more likely than men to vote, wear a political button, or work for political campaigns.
Conclusion: Our analysis reveals that political knowledge differentially affects men's and women's political participation. These findings complement existing scholarship that finds women hold themselves to a higher standard before engaging in political activities such as running for elected office.
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Does Education Increase Political Participation?
Alexander Mayer
Journal of Politics, July 2011, Pages 633-645
Abstract:
The consensus among scholars has long held that educational advancement causes greater political participation. Recent research, however, argues that previous empirical analyses of this relationship cannot be used to draw causal inferences. This recent work strongly suggests that selection mechanisms confound previous results, and it employs propensity score matching to argue that education has no effect. In this article I show how propensity score matching, as recently applied to this question, introduces bias by creating poorly matched treatment and control groups. I analyze the same data, realigning the treatment with theories of political participation, and I use genetic matching to create balanced treatment and control groups. I then subject the results to a variety of tests, providing a stronger foundation for causal inference. The estimates provide consistent evidence that, contrary to recent results, educational advancement increases political participation.
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Education and Political Participation: Exploring the Causal Link
Adam Berinsky & Gabriel Lenz
Political Behavior, September 2011, Pages 357-373
Abstract:
One of the most consistently documented relationships in the field of political behavior is the close association between educational attainment and political participation. Although most research assumes that this association arises because education causes participation, it could also arise because education proxies for the factors that lead to political engagement: the kinds of people who participate in politics may be the kinds of people who tend to stay in school. To test for a causal effect of education, we exploit the rise in education levels among males induced by the Vietnam draft. We find little reliable evidence that education induced by the draft significantly increases participation rates.
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Amy Syvertsen et al.
Journal of Research on Adolescence, September 2011, Pages 586-594
Abstract:
Using annual cross-sectional data from Monitoring the Future, the present study examined trends in high school seniors' current and anticipated civic participation and beliefs over a 30-year period. We examined overall trends and patterns based on youths' post-high school educational plans. Findings point to declines in recent cohorts' involvement in conventional and alternative forms of engagement but greater involvement in community service. Regardless of period, the majority of youth said they intended to vote when eligible, but few expressed trust in the government or elected officials. All civic indicators showed significant differences based on youths' college aspirations: Youth who planned to graduate from a 4-year college were more civically inclined than their peers with 2-year or no college plans.
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Sense of Control and Voting: A Genetically-Driven Relationship
Levente Littvay, Paul Weith & Christopher Dawes
Social Science Quarterly, December 2011, Pages 1236-1252
Objectives: The impact of political efficacy on political participation has been established in numerous classical studies of political behavior. However, the effects of more general measures of efficacy on political efficacy and voter turnout have received almost no attention. Additionally, seemingly independent contemporary developments in the field of political science proposed that political participation is heritable. In this study, we propose to link the two literatures, highlighting one possible mechanism through which genetic inheritance of political behavior is possible in the absence of the evolutionary time horizons of voting behavior. We theorize that heritability of psychological dispositions, such as one's sense of control, is more plausible and indirectly, through political efficacy, could have an influence on one's decision to vote.
Methods: We test our hypotheses using a classical twin study design (ACE models) and Cholesky decomposition models on data from the MIDUS (first wave) and MNTPS twin surveys.
Results: Empirically we find a relationship between general efficacy and turnout. We show that numerous operationalizations of efficacy are highly heritable and their covariance with turnout is predominantly driven by underlying additive genetic sources. On the other hand, environmental covariation between general and political efficacy and turnout is not significantly different from zero.
Conclusions: Our analysis contributes to a better understanding of how one's sense of control influences voting behavior. Our results provide sufficient evidence to claim that the covariation between these two traits can primarily be attributed to genetic factors. However, this is certainly not the only pathway that explains the heritability of voter turnout.
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Understanding the Rise of Talk Radio
Jeffrey Berry & Sarah Sobieraj
PS: Political Science & Politics, October 2011, Pages 762-767
Abstract:
The number of radio stations airing political talk shows - predominantly conservative talk radio - has surged in the past few years. This massive change in the radio industry says something about the emand for such shows, but attributing the rise of talk radio to a corresponding rise in conservative popular opinion is misleading. We argue that this remarkable growth is better explained by the collision of two changes that have transformed the radio business: deregulation and the mainstreaming of digital music technologies. Regulatory changes have shifted much of radio production and control from local to mass production (managed by industry giants such as Clear Channel Communications) and created a context ripe for nationally syndicated hosts such as Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and Mark Levin. Meanwhile, rapid technological changes have given consumers more control over the way they listen to music. Technologies such as MP3 players, Internet radio, smart phones, and Pandora Radio have made it more difficult for stations with a music format to be profitable. As music programming has become more problematic, many stations have developed a highly successful business model by converting to talk formats airing nationally syndicated shows.
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‘You're all a bunch of pinkos': Rupert Murdoch and the politics of HarperCollins
David McKnight & Mitchell Hobbs
Media, Culture & Society, September 2011, Pages 835-850
Abstract:
News Corporation is one of the most closely studied international media conglomerates, headed by the world's most famous media proprietor. Yet, despite its prominence in the academic literature, little attention has been paid to the company's book publishing operations. This article seeks to rectify this oversight. It investigates some of the more controversial book deals made by HarperCollins, outlining a partisan publishing pattern that conforms to Murdoch's proclivity for conservative politics.
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Not going to Starbucks: Boycotts and the out-scouring of politics in the branded world
Bryant Simon
Journal of Consumer Culture, July 2011, Pages 145-167
Abstract:
Focusing on boycotts of Starbucks over last decade, this article looks more broadly at the current states of buying and civic engagement in the United States and abroad. Contrary to what Robert Putnam argues, at least in part, in his now classic text, Bowling Alone, this article suggests that, as formal electoral politics have lost their hold on many, citizens have not abandoned trying to change things or making their voices heard. Instead, they have increasingly expressed their ideas about everything from local affairs to foreign relations at the point of purchase - through in this case, not buying a widely recognized product to gain a say in the larger distribution of social power. ‘Open brands,' ones that are sensitive to consumer desires, have, in turn, responded, producing a kind of ‘rough democracy of buying' by offering political solutions to win or retain customers. In the end, however, the evidence suggests that while pursuing political power through (not) buying makes sense and reflects broader changes in the neoliberal world, this strategy of engagement, nonetheless, had severe limits. The stories of Starbucks boycotts show that consumer actions are easily co-opted by the marketing prowess and deft moves of multi-national brands and by the notion held by some consumers that (not) buying is enough as a study of these boycotts also points to a new way of seeing buying not so much as politics themselves but a stage in the process of politicalization.
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Partisan Cleavages in the Importance of Citizenship Rights and Responsibilities
Hilde Coffé & Catherine Bolzendahl
Social Science Quarterly, September 2011, Pages 656-674
Objective: Research indicates partisan polarization on a number of social and moral attitudes. However, it is unclear whether a similar polarization can be found regarding citizenship norms, a question we investigate.
Methods: Using 2004 GSS data, we examine regression results analyzing citizens' beliefs about a wide range of citizenship duties and rights based on their partisan identity.
Results: Democrats and Republicans differ little in regard to many key rights and duties, such as the importance of voting and the right to equal treatment by the government. However, compared to Republicans, Democrats attach more importance to social duties and rights for political participation and for minority groups. Independents are most distinctive, placing much less importance on political duties and social rights of equality and an adequate standard of living, particularly in comparison to Democrats.
Conclusion: The majority of Americans share a common set of citizenship norms. Yet, some differences occur along partisan lines, and Independents hold weaker citizenship norms compared to Republicans and Democrats.