Communicating safety precautions can help maintain in-person voter turnout during a pandemic
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Merkley E
PROVIDER: S-EPMC8796996 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
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Project description:Since Downs proposed that the act of voting is irrational in 1957, myriad models have been proposed to explain voting and account for observed turnout patterns. We propose a model in which partisans consider both the instrumental and expressive benefits of their vote when deciding whether or not to abstain in an election, introducing an asymmetry that most other models do not consider. Allowing learning processes within our electorate, we analyze what evolutionarily stable strategies are rationalizable under various conditions. Upon varying electorate size, the partisan split of the electorate, and the degree to which an electorate takes underdog considerations into account in its payoff structure, we find that different equilibria arise. Our model predicts comparative statics that are consistent with voter behavior, specifically affirming a "size effect," in which turnout decreases as electorate size increases. Furthermore, relaxing some of our preliminary assumptions eliminates some of the discrepancies between the predictions of our model and empirical voter behavior. In particular, our work demonstrates that misperceptions about the partisan split of an electorate may account for high turnout behavior .Supplementary informationThe online version supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13235-021-00384-1.
| S-EPMC8542561 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Three randomized experiments found that subtle linguistic cues have the power to increase voting and related behavior. The phrasing of survey items was varied to frame voting either as the enactment of a personal identity (e.g., "being a voter") or as simply a behavior (e.g., "voting"). As predicted, the personal-identity phrasing significantly increased interest in registering to vote (experiment 1) and, in two statewide elections in the United States, voter turnout as assessed by official state records (experiments 2 and 3). These results provide evidence that people are continually managing their self-concepts, seeking to assume or affirm valued personal identities. The results further demonstrate how this process can be channeled to motivate important socially relevant behavior.
| S-EPMC3150938 | biostudies-literature
Project description:PurposeThe ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) severely impacted both health and the economy. Absent an effective vaccine, preventive measures used, some of which are being relaxed, have included school closures, restriction of movement, and banning of large gatherings. Our goal was to estimate the association of voter turnout with county-level COVID-19 risks.MethodsWe used publicly available data on voter turnout in the March 10 primary in three states, COVID-19 confirmed cases by day and county, and county-level census data. We used zero-inflated negative binomial regression to estimate the association of voter turnout with COVID-19 incidence, adjusted for county-level population density and proportions: over age 65 years, female, Black, with college education, with high school education, poor, obese, and smokers.ResultsCOVID-19 risk was associated with voter turnout, most strongly in Michigan during the week starting 3 days postelection (risk ratio, 1.24; 95% confidence interval, 1.16-1.33). For longer periods, the association was progressively weaker (risk ratio 0.98-1.03).ConclusionsDespite increased absentee-ballot voting in the primary, our results suggest an association of voter turnout in at least one state with a detectable increase in risks associated with and perhaps due to greater exposures related to the primary.
| S-EPMC7328545 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Low rates of youth voting are a feature of contemporary democracies the world over, with the United States having some of the lowest youth turnout rates in the world. However, far too little is known about how to address the dismal rates of youth voter participation found in many advanced democracies. In this paper, we examine the causal effect of a potentially scalable solution that has attracted renewed interest today: voluntary national service programs targeted at the youth civilian population. Leveraging the large pool of young people who apply each year to participate in the Teach For America (TFA) program-a prominent voluntary national service organization in the United States that integrates college graduates into teaching roles in low-income communities for 2 y-we examine the effect of service participation on voter turnout. To do so, we match TFA administrative records to large-scale nationwide voter files and employ a fuzzy regression discontinuity design around the recommended admittance cutoff for the TFA program. We find that serving as a teacher in the Teach For America national service program has a large effect on civic participation-substantially increasing voter turnout rates among applicants admitted to the program. This effect is noticeably larger than that of previous efforts to increase youth turnout. Our results suggest that civilian national service programs targeted at young people have great promise in helping to narrow the stubborn and enduring political engagement gap between younger and older citizens.
| S-EPMC9304004 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Twin and adoption studies have shown that individual differences in political participation can be explained, in part, by genetic variation. However, these research designs cannot identify which genes are related to voting or the pathways through which they exert influence, and their conclusions rely on possibly restrictive assumptions. In this study, we use three different US samples and a Swedish sample to test whether genes that have been identified as associated with educational attainment, one of the strongest correlates of political participation, predict self-reported and validated voter turnout. We find that a polygenic score capturing individuals' genetic propensity to acquire education is significantly related to turnout. The strongest associations we observe are in second-order midterm elections in the United States and European Parliament elections in Sweden, which tend to be viewed as less important by voters, parties, and the media and thus present a more information-poor electoral environment for citizens to navigate. A within-family analysis suggests that individuals' education-linked genes directly affect their voting behavior, but, for second-order elections, it also reveals evidence of genetic nurture. Finally, a mediation analysis suggests that educational attainment and cognitive ability combine to account for between 41% and 63% of the relationship between the genetic propensity to acquire education and voter turnout.
| S-EPMC8685665 | biostudies-literature
Project description:ObjectiveThe aim of this article is to assess the impact of Covid-19 safety measures on voter wait times during the 2020 U.S. election.MethodsMultinomial logistic regression models predicting voter wait times contingent on the presence of Covid safety measures: poll workers wearing face coverings, protective barriers separating voters and workers, voters and booths socially distanced, hand sanitizer, single-use ballot marking pens, and cleaning voting booths between voters, as well as an additive index of these measures.ResultsFindings suggest Covid-safety measures significantly affected voter wait times. Effects vary by Covid safety feature, with face coverings, barriers, social distancing, and cleaning booths increasing voter wait times (typically around 10-30 min), single-use pens decreasing voter wait times, and hand sanitizer having no effect. Results are further confirmed using an additive index.ConclusionCovid safety features likely increased voter wait times during the 2020 U.S. election, potentially accounting for a portion of the increased voter wait time, compared to previous elections.
| S-EPMC9115441 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Much has been written on the positive effect of direct democracy (initiatives, referendums) on voter turnout. However, we have limited knowledge about potential differential effects on voters belonging to various ethnic groups. The paper argues that depending on a group's responsiveness to the political context, direct democracy can (dis-)integrate voters (from) into the electorate. Empirical analysis of Current Population Survey (CPS) voting supplement survey data, together with data on the absolute use of direct democracy across US states, corroborates this theoretical expectation, however lending more support for the disintegrating assumption. Frequent direct democratic elections further widen the negative voting gap between first-generation Asian voters and voters living in the US for three generations or longer, whereas they tend to diminish this voting gap for first-generation Hispanic voters. The disintegrative pattern for first-generation Asian voters remains even significant when excluding California from the state sample, yet not the integrative tendency for first-generation Hispanics. Additional analyses using alternative measures of direct democracy and voting, and applying statistical adjustments to address causality concerns, confirm the robustness of these findings, which shed light on the so-far underexplored (dis-)integrative potential of political institutions.
| S-EPMC7900089 | biostudies-literature
Project description:One of the core tenets of a well-functioning representative democracy is that the people who vote to elect government officials are representative of the public. Here we reinforce the idea that reality is far from this lofty ideal. We document the extent and nature of inequities in voter participation in the United States with a level of granularity and precision that previous research has not afforded. To do so, we use a unique nationwide dataset of approximately 400 million validated voting records across multiple election cycles. With this novel dataset, we document large and persistent gaps in voter turnout by race, age, and political affiliation. Minority citizens, young people, and those who support the Democratic Party are much less likely to vote than whites, older citizens, and Republican Party supporters. Minorities, youth, and democrats are also much more likely to live in local communities where fewer individuals vote-areas that we term turnout deserts. Turnout deserts are especially pernicious given that they are self-reinforcing-bolstered by the social dynamics that fundamentally shape citizens' voting patterns. Our results show just how glaring inequities in political participation are in the US. These patterns threaten the very fabric of our democracy and fundamentally shift the balance of political power in the halls of government towards the interests of whites, older citizens, and republicans. They illustrate that participation in the United States is strikingly unequal-far from the ideals that this country has long aspired to.
| S-EPMC9177044 | biostudies-literature
Project description:What is the effect of pandemics on partisan perceptions of government competence? Taking the case of Covid-19 in the UK, we explore how voters' assessments of the government's handling of the economy and health were affected by four events: the first UK Covid-19 death; the national lockdown; Boris Johnson's hospitalisation; and Cummings' scandal. Using a large representative weekly survey in the last year totalling over around 30'000 respondents, our results show that Labour voters had the worst assessments of government handling. The first death deteriorated perceptions of government handling of health among both Labour and Conservative voters, while Boris Johnson's hospitalisation improved perceptions among most voters. Lockdown improved the perception of health handling but at the cost of more negative perceptions of its handling of the economy. The Cummings scandal had a negative effect on perceptions of government handling of economy but surprisingly improved perceptions of its handling of health.
| S-EPMC8242772 | biostudies-literature
Project description:ObjectivesThe aim of this study was to assess nursing students' compliance to standard precautions during the COVID-19 pandemic.MethodsA cross-sectional study was conducted from December 2021 to June 2022, 816 nursing students participated in the study. A socio-demographic questionnaire and Compliance with Standard Precautions Scale were used to collect data. Means and percentages were used to report socio-demographic characteristics multiple regression analysis used to identify the factors influencing compliance with standard precautions.ResultsThe mean age of nursing students was 21.30 ± 1.31 years. The majority of nursing students were female, with 703 (86.2%) being female and 113 (13.8%) being male. Compliance among nursing students was 76.8% overall. Nursing students reported the highest compliance (97.7%) with putting used sharp articles into sharp boxes, with 97.1% compliance for covering mouth and nose when wearing a mask. Participants reported the lowest (38.6%) when it came to not recapping used needles after giving an injection. Regression analysis revealed that gender, year of study, and having needlestick injury or contact with blood/body fluids experience all influenced nursing students' compliance with standard precautions.ConclusionsDuring the pandemic, nursing students compliance to standard precautions was optimal, according to this study. More research should be done to assess nursing students' compliance with standard precautions and the effect of infection control strategies used to prevent COVID-19 transmission.
| S-EPMC10024895 | biostudies-literature