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This article digs into the relationship between voters' political resentment and their electoral choice in 2019 by focusing on the respondents' emotions towards politics. Using the RepResent 2019 voter survey, eight emotions are analysed in their relation to voting behaviour: four negative (anger, bitterness, worry and fear) and four positive (hope, relief, joy and satisfaction). We confirm that voters' emotional register is at least two-dimensional, with one positive and one negative dimension, opening the possibility for different combinations of emotions towards politics. We also find different emotional patterns across party choices, and more crucially, we uncover a significant effect of emotions (especially negative ones) on vote choice, even when controlling for other determinants. Finally, we look at the effect of election results on emotions and we observe a potential winner vs. loser effect with distinctive dynamics in Flanders and in Wallonia. ; info:eu-repo/semantics/published

In this paper, I have advanced what I regard as the "truly rational" account of voting behaviour. This account depends essentially on the application of relative price logic in the comparative institutional context. For that logic to get purchase, certain (I think, minimal) psychological assumptions are required. These assumptions are: that people have views about matters over which they exercise negligible control; and that they have a desire to express those views. Of course, they also have a desire for their own material flourishing. This latter desire predictably plays a larger role in market settings where the individual's choices are consequential; the former play a larger role in the electoral setting where the individual's choices are not consequential. When I say "larger" here, I mean relative to markets: and I mean LARGER by a factor of many thousands! This means that homo economicus and homo politicus are likely to be rather different animals- behaviourally speaking. This difference is, I think, something that the rational choice method properly applied would predict. To deny it requires what seem to me to be very strong psychological claims about expressive and instrumental preferences - namely that they are very highly correlated. No one, to my knowledge, has provided any direct evidence on this matter. Certainly, the fact that we can find occasional instances (areas of policy say) where they do appear to be highly correlated does not, of course, establish the case one way or the other! Equally, to assert a difference in market and political behaviour does not commit one to a "wholly different model of man". On the contrary, it is this same model of man - the rational responder to incentive changes - that drives the whole analysis. I am totally committed to the logic of rationality. But I believe that much of public choice has got the "behavioural implications" of that logic just plain wrong! Voters and consumers are the same, rational persons: but the considerations that drive them in the marketplace where their choices are decisive are not the same considerations that drive them in the ballot-box. In that sense, rational choice logic predicts that homo economicus and homo politicus will exhibit different behaviours, in the sense that the kinds of considerations that weigh with them are likely to be rather different.

In this paper, I have advanced what I regard as the "truly rational" account of voting behaviour. This account depends essentially on the application of relative price logic in the comparative institutional context. For that logic to get purchase, certain (I think, minimal) psychological assumptions are required. These assumptions are: that people have views about matters over which they exercise negligible control; and that they have a desire to express those views. Of course, they also have a desire for their own material flourishing. This latter desire predictably plays a larger role in market settings where the individual's choices are consequential; the former play a larger role in the electoral setting where the individual's choices are not consequential. When I say "larger" here, I mean relative to markets: and I mean LARGER by a factor of many thousands! This means that homo economicus and homo politicus are likely to be rather different animals- behaviourally speaking. This difference is, I think, something that the rational choice method properly applied would predict. To deny it requires what seem to me to be very strong psychological claims about expressive and instrumental preferences - namely that they are very highly correlated. No one, to my knowledge, has provided any direct evidence on this matter. Certainly, the fact that we can find occasional instances (areas of policy say) where they do appear to be highly correlated does not, of course, establish the case one way or the other! Equally, to assert a difference in market and political behaviour does not commit one to a "wholly different model of man". On the contrary, it is this same model of man - the rational responder to incentive changes - that drives the whole analysis. I am totally committed to the logic of rationality. But I believe that much of public choice has got the "behavioural implications" of that logic just plain wrong! Voters and consumers are the same, rational persons: but the considerations that drive them in the marketplace where their choices are decisive are not the same considerations that drive them in the ballot-box. In that sense, rational choice logic predicts that homo economicus and homo politicus will exhibit different behaviours, in the sense that the kinds of considerations that weigh with them are likely to be rather different.

Analyzing the relationships between political parties and voters is one of the central topics of political science. Parties are expected either to be responsive to the demands of their voters or are presumed to have the power to influence voting decisions by structuring the political discourse and thereby competition regarding political issues. These two aspects are covered in the literature by research on the way parties present themselves and by electoral research, respectively. Focusing on the latter, this state-of-the-art article reviews how recent publications have analyzed the impact of party competition (macro level) on vote choice (individual level). It does so by introducing the most prominent theories of voting and party competition, summarizing the most recent results and pointing to potential problems for international comparisons such as methodological choices and different approaches to the measurement of party positions. ZusammenfassungDie Analyse der Beziehungen zwischen politischen Parteien und Wahlern ist eines der zentralen Themen der Politikwissenschaft. Hinsichtlich der Parteien wird davon ausgegangen, dass sie sich entweder responsiv gegenuber den Forderungen ihrer Wahler zeigen oder aber die Macht haben, deren Wahlentscheidung zu beeinflussen, indem sie den politischen Diskurs und damit den Wettbewerb um politische Themen strukturieren. Diese beiden Aspekte werden zum einen in der Parteien-, zum anderen in der Wahlforschung behandelt. Mit Blick auf Letztere wird in diesem State-of-the-Art-Artikel dargestellt, wie neuere Veroffentlichungen die Auswirkungen des Parteienwettbewerbs (Makroebene) auf die Wahlentscheidung (Individualebene) analysieren. Dies geschieht durch eine Einfuhrung in die wichtigsten Theorien zur Wahlentscheidung und zum Parteienwettbewerb, auf deren Grundlage eine Zusammenfassung der Ergebnisse neuerer, quantitativer Studien erfolgt. Potenzielle Probleme fur den internationalen Vergleich werden hierbei ebenso erortert wie wichtige methodische Neuerungen und die verschiedenen verfugbaren Ansatze zur Messung von Parteienpositionen.

This dissertation addresses the effects of electoral complexity for voters and how voter responses to complexity affect the quality of representation. I identify a tradeoff between more representative elections and the cognitive burdens longer ballots create for voters. Chapter 1 provides the motivation for the project and highlights the role of choice set size in creating complexity for voters. Chapter 2 tests for a relationship between the number of candidates and participation rates in four Brazilian elections. In Chapter 3, I introduce an experimental approach to study the microfoundations of the effects of complexity on voters. Using a survey experiment that randomly varies ballot length and the presence of information about candidates' partisan affiliations, I find strong support for the relationship identified in Chapter 2. When presented with more candidates, many voters are deterred from participating, with party labels facilitating participation but not mitigating the effects of choice set size. Chapter 4 turns to the consequences of complexity for voters' information acquisition strategies. Using a second survey experiment, I manipulate both ballot length and the candidates' attributes while monitoring voters' information acquisition strategies. Here I introduce an original online survey platform that fully randomizes the generation of the experimental ballots as well as a new measure of correct policy voting. I find that even for those voters who are not deterred by complex ballots, variations in the number of candidates can have substantial effects on their decision-making strategies. When presented with more candidates, many voters learn less about their options, rely on potentially unreliable cues of candidates quality, and make poor choices

The paper builds upon an original pre- and post-election survey that we conducted before and after the 2015 Canadian election. Directly after Election Day, we asked Canadians for which party they voted, and whether they regret their choice. We find that 39% of them are not perfectly happy with their decision, and 4% even say that they made a bad decision. We show that the propensity to regret can be explained by a mixed-utility theory, whereby voters attempt to maximize a mixture of instrumental and expressive utilities. Our study contributes to the literatures on voting behavior and political economy, which usually considers that voters are either instrumental or expressive, but not both at the same time.

Voter choice is one of the most important problems in political science. The most common models assume that voting is a rational choice based on policy positions (e.g., key issues) and non-policy information (e.g., social identity, personality). Though such models explain macroscopic features of elections, they also reveal important anomalies that have been resistant to explanation. We argue for a new approach that builds upon recent research in cognitive science and neuroscience; specifically, we contend that policy positions and social identities do not combine in merely an additive manner, but compete to determine voter preferences. This model not only explains several key anomalies in voter choice, but also suggests new directions for research in both political science and cognitive science.

Our study examines the influence of various candidate characteristics (sociodemographic profile, competence and experience, issue positions, and party affiliation) on voters' preference for a candidate, and investigates the impact of voters' levels of political sophistication on their likelihood of considering various candidate characteristics voters when deciding whom to support. Using data from the 2015 Finnish National Election Study, this study is situated within the complex Finnish open list system with many candidates at display and mandatory preference voting. We find that voters mostly argue to make their choice based on candidate characteristics with direct politically relevant information such as candidate party affiliation and issue positions. Candidate sociodemographic profile has relatively little stated impact. Overall, voters with higher levels of political sophistication tend to be more likely to consider a broad range of candidate characteristics. When investigating the relative impact of each candidate characteristic (that is, their impact relative to the other candidate characteristics) on voting behaviour, political sophistication increases the likelihood of saying to rely on candidate characteristics that are more demanding in terms of information processing such as competence and experience, and issue positions. Our analyses also show how different measures of political sophistication have distinct effects.

Perhaps the most important question in American politics asks what motivates a candidate on Election Day? Voter's decisions affect the direction of our country over the next four years. A long running debate in political science deals with the rationality of voters, concerning itself with the main indicators of vote choice, which include party versus policy. The paper advances these debates to the 21st century, addressing the results from the 2008, 2012, 2016, and 2020 general elections using data sets from the ANES Data Center. The data sets were analyzed using a logistic regression to operationalize each explanation. The results of this regression analysis point to three major factors that impact voter choice, party identification, economic issues, and qualities of a candidate. The data made clear that party identification provided the most powerful explanation around voter choice, with a notable increase in partisan voting from 2008 to the 2020 election. The research also pointed to the fact economic issues were incredibly important to voters, arguing voters who have a negative outlook on the economy typically vote for the out party. The conclusion points to the nuance of vote choice, proving that each factor of voter choice relates to one another.

Explanations of party competition and vote choice are commonly based on the Downsian view of politics: parties maximise votes by adopting positions on policy dimensions. However, recent research suggests that British voters choose parties based on evaluations of competence rather than on ideological position. This paper proposes a theoretical account which combines elements of the spatial model with the 'issue ownership' approach. Whereas the issue ownership theory has focused mainly on party competition, this paper examines the validity of the model from the perspective of both parties and voters, by testing its application to recent British general elections. Our findings suggest that as parties have converged ideologically, competence considerations have become more important than ideological position in British elections. © 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Critics of giving citizens under 18 the right to vote argue that such teenagers lack the ability and motivation to participate effectively in elections. If this argument is true, lowering the voting age would have negative consequences for the quality of democracy. We test the argument using survey data from Austria, the only European country with a voting age of 16 in nation-wide elections. While the turnout levels of young people under 18 are relatively low, their failure to vote cannot be explained by a lower ability or motivation to participate. In addition, the quality of these citizens' choices is similar to that of older voters, so they do cast votes in ways that enable their interests to be represented equally well. These results are encouraging for supporters of a lower voting age.

Our study examines the influence of various candidate characteristics (sociodemographic profile, competence and experience, issue positions, and party affiliation) on voters' preference for a candidate, and investigates the impact of voters' levels of political sophistication on their likelihood of considering various candidate characteristics voters when deciding whom to support. Using data from the 2015 Finnish National Election Study, this study is situated within the complex Finnish open list system with many candidates at display and mandatory preference voting. We find that voters mostly argue to make their choice based on candidate characteristics with direct politically relevant information such as candidate party affiliation and issue positions. Candidate sociodemographic profile has relatively little stated impact. Overall, voters with higher levels of political sophistication tend to be more likely to consider a broad range of candidate characteristics. When investigating the relative impact of each candidate characteristic (that is, their impact relative to the other candidate characteristics) on voting behaviour, political sophistication increases the likelihood of saying to rely on candidate characteristics that are more demanding in terms of information processing such as competence and experience, and issue positions. Our analyses also show how different measures of political sophistication have distinct effects. ; Peer reviewed

Previous studies have portrayed the personalization of politics as a consequence of the changes in the electoral market and the resulting transformations at the party level. However, empirical research has not reached a consensus on the extent to which this process has actually exerted its impact on citizens' voting calculus. Partisan identifications appear still central in voters' behavior, whereas party leader evaluations seem to play only a marginal role. This paper tries to examine the electoral consequences of the personalization of politics employing an alternative perspective. In particular, we concentrate on the role played by leader evaluations in shaping voters' feelings of identification with parties. Our case study focuses on the Italian case, a prototype of personalized parliamentary democracy. In the empirical section, we examine the ways in which leaders have influenced Italian voters' behavior in the last two decades. The results show that the electoral effect of party leaders (once the mediating effect of party identification is taken into account) has steadily increased during the time frame under analysis.

In many countries with multiparty systems, a decline in class voting has increased volatility and the need for comprehensive information about the political landscape among voters. Voting Advice Applications (VAAs) are online tools that match users to political parties and, as such, they hold a promise of reinforcing informational transparency and democratic representation. The current research investigated whether VAAs live up to this expectation by investigating to what extent VAAs affected users' political knowledge and vote choice in the Dutch national elections of 2012. Results show that VAA users feel that the VAA improved their political knowledge. In addition, those groups of VAA users who experienced a large knowledge increase, also relatively often indicated that their vote choice had been affected. This suggests that VAAs contribute to informational transparency by increasing knowledge among a potentially wide audience, and also that VAAs might increase democratic representation to the extent that VAAs persuade people to vote for the candidate that best represents their opinions. On the other hand, we found discrepancies between behavioural and perceptual measurements of the effect of VAAs on vote choice. This raises doubts about whether VAAs shape actual voting behaviours and knowledge, or rather perceptions of that.

Does the public perception of governments' coronavirus pandemic responses actually make a difference to their electoral fortunes? In this research note, we answer that question by presenting the preliminary results of a survey of more than 3,000 voters in Croatia and Serbia conducted on a dedicated mobile app and web platform directly preceding parliamentary elections that took place in these two countries during the summer of 2020. This survey was part of our larger project tracking political competition, public discourse, and conspiracy theories in Southeast Europe during the coronavirus pandemic. The preliminary findings presented in this research note demonstrate Croatian and Serbian voters were rationally retrospective and rewarded parties in power based on evaluations of their crisis management performance. We also find evidence of voters who have personally witnessed the health consequences of the coronavirus being more likely to support the parties in power. We believe this is evidence of the coronavirus pandemic increasing affected citizens' expectations of and trust in national governments where those governments respond strongly to the pandemic's first wave, as was the case in both Croatia and Serbia.