Voter Behavior

Chapter 6 Section 4

Key Terms• Off-Year Election• Ballot Fatigue• Political Efficacy• Political Socialization• Gender Gap• Party Identification• Straight Ticket Voting• Split Ticket Voting• Independent

Nonvoting

• Term idiot is Greek for non-voter• Millions of Americans do not vote• Election day 2008 some 121 million votes

were cast• Only 53% of electorate voted• Off-Year Elections-the congressional

elections held in the even numbered years between the presidential elections

• Some people do not vote for all the candidates

• Ballot fatigue- the further your name is down on a ballot the fewer votes you receive

• Sometimes voters exhaust their patience or knowledge

• More people vote for statewide offices instead of county or local elections

• Turn out in congressional districts is higher in presidential years.

Why People Do Not Vote

• 2008 data 100 million people did not vote• 10 million of them are aliens and are barred

from voting• 5 to 6 million are ill• 2 to 3 million had top travel unexpectedly• Race, religious biases also play a role

Actual Nonvoters

• In 2008, 80 million people who could vote did not in the Presidential election

• Reasons– People think there vote will nor make a difference– Many do not trust politicians– They either fear or scorn the system– Political efficacy-lacking any feeling of influence

or effectiveness in politics

• More reasons– Cumbersome election process (inconvenient

registration process)– Long ballots/long lines at the polling places– Bad weather– Time-zone fallout (polls in the East and central

close before the west) results are forecast before they have voted

Comparing Voters and Nonvoters

• 1.Results of particular elections– Individual votes are secret– Areas largely populated by African Americans or

Catholics or high income groups will indicate how they voted

• 2. Survey Research– Scientific polls determine cross sections of

population (Gallup/Pew) – Measure public opinion

• 3. Political Socialization-process by which people gain their political attitude and opinions– Begins in early childhood– Continues throughout your life– Experiences and relationships that lead people to

see the political world in a certain way

Factors that Influence Voters

• Sociological and psychological factors– Sociological- pieces of the voters social and

economic life (two kinds)• 1. a voters personal characteristics-age, race, income,

occupation, education, religion• 2. voters group affiliations- family- coworkers, friends

– Psychological- study of the mind and individual behavior• Voter perception- how the voter sees the party,

candidate and the issues of the election

• The differences between the two are not great.

• Closely related to each other• Constantly interact• How voters look at parties, candidates or

issues is often shaped by their own social and economic backgrounds

Sociological Factors

• College graduates are more likely to vote Republican

• So are persons over 50• African Americans more likely to vote for

Democrats• So are labor unions• How would a 55 year old college-educated

African American who belongs to the AFL-CIO vote?

Income and Occupation

• Voters in lower income brackets usually vote for Democrats

• Voters in higher income usually vote for Republicans

• 2008 election was the exception– Making under $50,000 (Barack Obama)– $50,000 and up evenly divided between the two– Won 52% of the vote of those who made over

$200,000 (Barack Obama)

• Often how much someone earns and what they do for a living are closely related– Professional and business people – Other high incomes regularly tend to the Republican side– Manual workers – and lower income workers tend to the Democrat side– With the exception of 1964 and 2008 professional and

business people voted heavily Republican in every modern era election

Education

• College graduates high percentage Republican voters than those who graduate high school

• High school graduates vote more Republican than those who just finished grade school

• Except for 2008

Gender, Age

• Gender Gap- the difference in partisan choices between men and women

• First appeared in the 1980’s• Women generally tend to favor Democrats by

a ten percent margin• Men often give the GOP the same margin

• Traditionally younger voters tend to vote for the Democrats

• Older voters for the GOP• Men and women vote differently on health

care, abortion, other social matters• 1960-1980 Democrats won a large majority of

voters under 30

• This pattern was broken by Ronald Reagan in 1984 and George Bush in 1988

• Bill Clinton restored the Democratic claim in 1992

• 2008 held the tradition for younger voters garnering 66% of the under 30 vote

Religious, Ethnic Background

• Protestants preferred GOP• Catholics and Jews the Democrats• 2008 election supported that trend• African American voters for decades have

supported the Democratic party• They form the only group that has given a

clear majority in every presidential election since 1952

• In the North, African Americans voted Republicans until the 1930’s (New Deal)

• Civil rights movement 1960’s much greater African American participation in southern politics

• Today African Americans are overwhelmingly Democratic

Geography

• South East corner of the country became known as the solid South (Democrats)

• The GOP now carries that area• States that consistently support Republicans– Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, Kansas, Nebraska, and the

Dakotas

• Democrats carry– Have made inroads into the Northeast section

• Republicans still dominate the suburbs, smaller cities and rural areas

Family and Other Group

• Family members vote in a strikingly familiar way

• 9 out of 10 married couples share the same partisan leaning

• Those who work together and circles of friends vote alike

Psychological Factors

• Party identification- the loyalty of people to a particular political party.

• The single most significant and lasting predictor of how a person will vote

• Democrat or Republican will likely vote for all their parties candidates

• Democrats draw strength from big cities of the North and East and Pacific Coast

• Straight ticket voting- the practice of voting for all the candidates of only one party in elections

• Party identification is a key factor in politics• Though it has lost some of its power recently• Split ticket- the practice of voting for

candidates of more than one party• This behavior began to increase in the 1960’s

• Independents- those people who do not have a party affiliation

• Independent is a tricky term most vote for a candidate of one of the major parties.

• Number of independents is between a fourth and one third of all voters

• New breed of independent from the 1960’s and 1970’s

• New voters preferred not to be identified by party.

Candidates and Issues

• Party identification is a long term factor• They may support the candidates but not the

way they vote• Short term factors can cause voters to switch

sides– Impression the candidate make– Their image– Personal character and appearance

• Issues have become important over the last 40 years– Civil rights movement, Viet Nam War, feminist

movement, Watergate scandal, economic problems

– Recent years- severe economic recession, Iraq and Afghanistan