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The character of elections critically affects the dialogue of democracy. This article examines that dialogue in 143 US Senate elections, 1988-1998, in which an incumbent sought reelection. We go beyond previous research on the impact of campaign spending to focus on the character of the contest itself, particularly the impact of negative campaigning. Campaign strategies are endogenous to the campaign itself, requiring plausible instruments & two-stage statistical techniques to produce reliable estimates. Our analyses combine information on the relative "tone" of US Senate campaigns with an original aggregate data set & ANES survey data. We ask a simple question: how effective is negative campaigning in helping to get candidates elected? Our results provide no straightforward answer. In general, dependent on the opponent's strategy, negative campaigning is relatively effective for challengers, while positive campaigning is more effective for incumbents. Our results do provide clear evidence that the campaign "matters.". 6 Tables, 1 Figure, 1 Appendix, 46 References. Adapted from the source document.

This paper addresses a very important question for media researchers, political campaigners, & democratic theorists alike: Does negative campaigning demobilize the electorate? Using both aggregate- & individual-level turnout data & evidence on the nature or "tone" of virtually every US Senate campaign, 1988-1998, we find that campaign negativism has a curvilinear effect on turnout, with most observed levels of negativism actually stimulating turnout. Only at extremely high levels does negativism in political campaigns generally suppress turnout. We find no consistent evidence that person-based criticisms of the opponent have any different effect than policy-based criticisms. However, we do find support for the hypothesis that partisans tend to be stimulated by campaign negativism while independents are more likely to be discouraged by such campaigns. 2 Tables, 3 Figures, 21 References. Adapted from the source document.

This article challenges the often-untested assumption that cognitive "heuristics" improve the decision-making abilities of everyday voters. The potential benefits & costs of five common political heuristics are discussed. A new dynamic process-tracing methodology is employed to directly observe the use of these five heuristics by voters in a mock presidential election campaign. We find that cognitive heuristics are at times employed by almost all voters & that they are particularly likely to be used when the choice situation facing voters is complex. A hypothesized interaction between political sophistication & heuristic use on the quality of decision making is obtained across several different experiments, however. As predicted, heuristic use generally increases the probability of a correct vote by political experts but decreases the probability of a correct vote by novices. A situation in which experts can be led astray by heuristic use is also illustrated. Discussion focuses on the implications of these findings for strategies to increase input from underrepresented groups into the political process. 5 Tables, 4 Figures, 80 References. Adapted from the source document.

This article examines the use of negative campaigning in US Senate election campaigns from 1988 to 1998. We explore the relationship of negativism to candidate characteristics, campaign activities and the political context of these elections by testing seven hypotheses about candidates' use of negative campaigning. Our results suggest that such practices are disproportionately employed by candidates with relatively few campaign resources, by challengers, by Republicans, by candidates in open seat races, and by candidates whose opponents `go negative'. Indeed, we estimate almost a one-for-one feedback of the opponent's negativism on the negativism of Senate candidate's own campaigns - which, borrowing from the international relations field, we refer to as Mutually Assured Detraction, or MAD. The article concludes with a discussion of the possible impact and desirability of negative campaigning in American elections, and speculation on the implications for politics in other democracies.

The average voter falls far short of the prescriptions of classic democratic theory in terms of interest, knowledge, and participation in politics. We suggest a more realistic standard: Citizens fulfill their democratic duties if, most of the time, they vote "correctly." Relying on an operationalization of correct voting based on fully informed interests, we present experimental data showing that, most of the time, people do indeed manage to vote correctly. We also show that voters' determinations of their correct vote choices can be predicted reasonably well with widely available survey data. We illustrate how this measure can be used to determine the proportion of the electorate voting correctly, which we calculate at about 75% for the five American presidential elections between 1972 and 1988. With a standard for correct vote decisions, political science can turn to exploring the factors that make it more likely that people will vote correctly.