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How does the social environment in which people are embedded impact their political behavior and attitudes? This dissertation provides substantive and methodological advances in answering this key question in political science research. Chapter 1 analyzes a get-out-the-vote field experiment involving more than 61 million individuals. The results show that the messages influenced political self-expression, information seeking, and real world voting behavior of millions of people. The effect of social information versus non-social information differed by characteristics of the treated individual such as age, education, relationship status, and the number of social contacts the individual has. These results suggest that while social information increases participation for overall, it is especially effective for subsets of the population. Chapter 2 analyzes the effect of one individual's turnout on that of her social contacts. Results indicate that when a friend votes an individual is about 7% more likely to vote. Chapter 3 develops a statistical model to estimate the ideology of politicians and their supporters using Facebook data about which users publicly support which political figures by 'liking' them on the site. Then, using this measure, I study the topography of ideology across a social network of more than 6 million people, and show that those individuals who are embedded in diverse ideological networks are less likely to turnout to vote than those in homogeneous social networks

What are the most important concepts in the political behavior literature? Have experiments supplanted surveys as the dominant method in political behavior research? What role does the American National Election Studies (ANES) play in this literature? We utilize a content analysis of over 1,100 quantitative articles on American mass political behavior published between 1980 and 2009 to address these questions. We then supplement this with a second sample of articles published between 2010 and 2018. Four key takeaways are apparent. First, the agenda of this literature is heavily skewed toward understanding voting to a relative lack of attention to specific policy attitudes and other topics. Second, experiments are ascendant, but are far from displacing surveys, and particularly the ANES. Third, while important changes to this agenda have occurred over time, it remains much the same in 2018 as it was in 1980. Fourth, the centrality of the ANES seems to stem from its time-series component. In the end, we conclude that the ANES is a critical investment for the scientific community and a main driver of political behavior research.

The authors develop theoretical ideas in Technical Report #7 and outline links to political behavior. Technical Report #9 is more abstract than TR #8. This paper develops a theoretical argument about social comparison processes involved in political behavior.

What are the most important concepts in the political behavior literature? Have experiments supplanted surveys as the dominant method in political behavior research? What role does the American National Election Studies (ANES) play in this literature? We utilize a content analysis of over 1,100 quantitative articles on American mass political behavior published between 1980 and 2009 to address these questions. We then supplement this with a second sample of articles published between 2010 and 2018. Four key takeaways are apparent. First, the agenda of this literature is heavily skewed toward understanding voting to a relative lack of attention to specific policy attitudes and other topics. Second, experiments are ascendant, but are far from displacing surveys, and particularly the ANES. Third, while important changes to this agenda have occurred over time, it remains much the same in 2018 as it was in 1980. Fourth, the centrality of the ANES seems to stem from its time-series component. In the end, we conclude that the ANES is a critical investment for the scientific community and a main driver of political behavior research.

Unlike the previous literature on mass policy feedback, the present paper argues that a negative message embodied in public policy may foster or dampen political participation depending on social group affiliation. The policy change we use to examine the effect of biased policy (a negative message) on political behavior is the removal of elected mayors that were replaced by an appointed committee in a large number of Arab and Jewish municipalities in Israel which was skewed significantly towards Arab municipalities. We show that Arab voters in intervened municipalities are more likely to show up in the ballot boxes in national elections and they tend to vote more for Arab parties. In contrast, the political participation of Jewish citizens is lower in municipalities with an appointed council without noticeable effect on vote choice.

What are the most important concepts in the political behavior literature? Have experiments supplanted surveys as the dominant method in political behavior research? What role does the American National Election Studies (ANES) play in this literature? We utilize a content analysis of over 1,100 quantitative articles on American mass political behavior published between 1980 and 2009 to address these questions. We then supplement this with a second sample of articles published between 2010 and 2018. Four key takeaways are apparent. First, the agenda of this literature is heavily skewed toward understanding voting to a relative lack of attention to specific policy attitudes and other topics. Second, experiments are ascendant, but are far from displacing surveys, and particularly the ANES. Third, while important changes to this agenda have occurred over time, it remains much the same in 2018 as it was in 1980. Fourth, the centrality of the ANES seems to stem from its time-series component. In the end, we conclude that the ANES is a critical investment for the scientific community and a main driver of political behavior research.

The main objective of the institute of higher learning is to produce students who are excellence in academic, innovative and prepared to face any challenges. Besides learning various disciplines of knowledge they also participate in campus politics. This article analyses the factors which form student political behavior on the campus and strategy undertaken by management and lecturer to make students innovative and progressive. A survey using questionnaires was carried out from a sample of 800 students in the main campus of the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). The result of the study shows that student political behavior was influenced by their family background and campus environment. The other factors are location and campus environment, welfare, racial composition, state of origin, mass media, issues, lecturer and university leadership. The strategy undertaken by the UKM management are to give more attention on student welfare, monitoring students activities, practicing student friendly policy and concept of hands on, introducing patriotic courses, built-up close relationship between student and top leadership and student union. Thus managing political behavior of campus students would be very interesting and challenging indeed for future analyses to look again into the question of young voting pattern in Malaysia. DOI:10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n4s3p48

Following the collapse of communism, religious observance increased dramatically in Russia. Many observers believed that religion would provide a basis for political mobilization, but this has not eventuated. According to nationally representative surveys conducted in 1993 and 1996, levels of church attendance in postcommimist Russia have stabilized; about three-quarters identify themselves as Orthodox and 17 percent as atheist, although only about one in ten attend church at least once a month. Frequent attenders were less likely to vote in 1993, but in the rather different circumstances of the 1995 Duma election they were more likely to vote than self-declared atheists. Frequent attenders were also more likely to engage in other forms of political participation, particularly writing to the press and contacting officials. But there were relatively weak consequences for voting, in December 1995 or in the 1996 presidential election, in the absence of major parties that deliberately mobilized a confessional vote. Several explanations are advanced to account for the weak influence of religion on politics, notably the absence of a civil society and of competition between denominations.

Following the collapse of communism, religious observance increased dramatically in Russia. Many observers believed that religion would provide a basis for political mobilization, but this has not eventuated. According to nationally representative surveys conducted in 1993 and 1996, levels of church attendance in postcommimist Russia have stabilized; about three-quarters identify themselves as Orthodox and 17 percent as atheist, although only about one in ten attend church at least once a month. Frequent attenders were less likely to vote in 1993, but in the rather different circumstances of the 1995 Duma election they were more likely to vote than self-declared atheists. Frequent attenders were also more likely to engage in other forms of political participation, particularly writing to the press and contacting officials. But there were relatively weak consequences for voting, in December 1995 or in the 1996 presidential election, in the absence of major parties that deliberately mobilized a confessional vote. Several explanations are advanced to account for the weak influence of religion on politics, notably the absence of a civil society and of competition between denominations.

Together with its further widening and deepening, the character of the EU has changed fundamentally during the last two decades. Acknowledging this development, the politics-dimension has become visibly more relevant in research on the EU. This "politics turn" is accompanied by an increased interest in research on political behavior of individual and collective actors—voters, parties, interest groups, executive agencies, mass and social media—in the EU multi-level system. The objectives of this thematic issue are to conceptually, empirically, and methodologically capture the different facets of this newly emerged interest in actors' political behavior in the EU multi-level system. To this end, the thematic issue strives to highlight the connections between political processes and behavior at the European level and other political layers in the EU Member States' multi-level systems. In particular, we aim to broaden the scope of research on political behavior in the EU and its strong focus on electoral politics across multiple levels of government. To this end, the thematic issue links research on voting behavior with work on party competition, electoral campaigns, public opinion, protest politics, responsiveness, (interest group) representation, government and opposition dynamics, and parliamentary behavior more broadly to the multi-layered systems within EU Member States.

What explains the variety of political behavior observed across the Arab world in recent years? We model political participation as a continuum from non-violent to violent activities where the chief purpose of political action is to signal discontent. The credibility of those signals, however, depends on the personal cost of political engagement, with the result being that individuals from both extreme high-cost and low-cost groups may self-exclude even when highly discontent. We show, further, that political violence constitutes a credible alternative for those for whom peaceful protest carries little signaling value. Using data from three nationally representative surveys of the Middle East and North Africa conducted over the past decade we find that socioeconomic status is generally, positively associated with non-violent political behavior of all types. Semi-parametric analysis reveals that political action, in keeping with our signaling framework, exhibits strong non-linear properties: the likelihood of participation in peaceful protests and strikes is highest among the upper-middle class, while support for violence is concentrated among the lower-middle class.

The study of political activism has grown significantly within the last fifty years. Political participation was always the cornerstone of research in political science, but the advent of comparative political behavior studies and quantitative analysis has paved the way for data-driven investigations of who votes, why people participate and what types of political activities citizens prefer. This article is an introduction to the main scholarship in political participation studies, its evolution since the beginning, the shift in focus from conventional activism to unconventional engagement, up to the most recent innovation of digital participation. The political behavior field has showed how citizens are not necessarily prepared to be polit-ical animals, how political interest and opportunities play a role in the levels of participation recorded and how individuals may choose newer, confrontational modes of political expression that better fit their needs. In the end, the entire development of this field of research highlights once more the relevance of political action, especially with regards to how participation has changed in Europe, over time and across borders.

IN ENGLISH: In Western European countries, studies on the relationship between class position and political outlooks so far have a limited understanding of the relevance of class analysis, while in semiperipheral countries, like Croatia, research on class-related mechanisms and political behavior is modest, with a clear deficit of empirical research. The main goal of class analysis is to have the potential to explain various life outcomes primarily through explaining and exploring relationships between class position and life chances. In this article, we have employed neo-Weberian class analysis with the purpose to explore the relationship between class position and political behavior. In the article we use the concept of political behavior as a broader term that consists of individuals' interest in politics, political efficacy, and political participation (voter turnout). We have used the data from the International Social Survey Program module Role of Government V from 2016. Analysis has shown that in Croatia, class membership is a predictor of interest in politics and political efficacy, i.e., that the members of a higher class show greater interest in politics and assess that they have a better understanding of politics. Class per se does not have a direct effect on voter turnout, but it is mediated through political efficacy and interest in politics since voting is mostly under the influence of personal interest in politics. --- IN CROATIAN: U zapadnoeuropskim zemljama istraživanja odnosa između klasne pozicije i političkih stavova do sada su pokazivala ograničeno shvaćanje važnosti klasne analize, a u zemljama polu-periferije, poput Hrvatske, istraživanja mehanizama povezanih s klasom i političkog ponašanja su skromna, s jasnim nedostatkom empirijskih istraživanja. Glavni cilj klasne analize je stvoriti mogućnost objašnjenja različitih životnih ishoda, prvenstveno kroz objašnjavanje i istraživanje odnosa između klasne pozicije i životnih šansi. U ovom smo članku koristili neoveberijansku klasnu analizu kako bismo istražili odnos između klasne pozicije i političkog ponašanja. U članku koristimo koncept političkog ponašanja kao širi termin koji se sastoji od zainteresiranosti pojedinaca za politiku, njihove političke efikasnosti te političke participacije (izlaska na izbore). Koristili smo podatke iz programa ISSP (International Social Survey Program) i to modula Uloga vlasti V iz 2016. godine. Analiza je pokazala da je u Hrvatskoj klasna pripadnost prediktor zainteresiranosti za politiku i političke efikasnosti, odnosno da pripadnici više klase pokazuju veće zanimanje za politiku i procjenjuju da se bolje razumiju u politiku. Klasa po sebi nema izravan učinak na izlazak na izbore, ali on je posredovan političkom efikasnošću i zanimanjem za politiku, obzirom da je glasovanje većinom pod utjecajem osobne zainteresiranosti za politiku.

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Cambridge University Press via the DOI in this record ; Data availability: The data, code, and any additional materials required to replicate all analyses in this article are available at the Journal of Experimental Political Science Dataverse within the Harvard Dataverse Network, at: doi:10.7910/DVN/HUJZMO ; Psychological attachment to political parties can bias people's attitudes, beliefs, and group evaluations. Studies from psychology suggest that self-affirmation theory may ameliorate this problem in the domain of politics on a variety of outcome measures. We report a series of studies conducted by separate research teams that examine whether a self-affirmation intervention affects a variety of outcomes, including political or policy attitudes, factual beliefs, conspiracy beliefs, affective polarization, and evaluations of news sources. The different research teams use a variety of self-affirmation interventions, research designs, and outcomes. Despite these differences, the research teams consistently find that self-affirmation treatments have little effect. These findings suggest considerable caution is warranted for researchers who wish to apply the self-affirmation framework to studies that investigate political attitudes and beliefs. By presenting the "null results" of separate research teams, we hope to spark a discussion about whether and how the self-affirmation paradigm should be applied to political topics. ; European Union Horizon 2020 ; NASA ; Energy Foundation ; University of Minnesota ; National Science Foundation (NSF)

A setting in which customer-owned mutual companies converted to publicly listed firms created a plausibly exogenous shock to salience of stock ownership. We use this shock to identify the effect of stock ownership on political behavior. Using IV regressions, difference-in-differences analyses, and matching methods, we find the shock changed the way people vote in the affected areas, with the demutualizations being followed by a 1.7–2.7 percentage points increase in rightof- center vote share. Analyses of demutualizations that did not involve public listing of shares suggest that explanations based on wealth, liquidity, and tax-related incentives do not drive the results.