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Americans discount the effect of friction on voter turnout
Whether or not someone turns out to vote depends on their beliefs (such as partisanship or sense of civic duty) and on friction—external barriers such as long travel distance to the polls. In this exploratory study, we tested whether people underestimate the effect of friction on turnout and overest...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
National Academy of Sciences
2022
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9407209/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35969772 http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2206072119 |
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author | Mazar, Asaf Tomaino, Geoff Carmon, Ziv Wood, Wendy |
author_facet | Mazar, Asaf Tomaino, Geoff Carmon, Ziv Wood, Wendy |
author_sort | Mazar, Asaf |
collection | PubMed |
description | Whether or not someone turns out to vote depends on their beliefs (such as partisanship or sense of civic duty) and on friction—external barriers such as long travel distance to the polls. In this exploratory study, we tested whether people underestimate the effect of friction on turnout and overestimate the effect of beliefs. We surveyed a representative sample of eligible US voters before and after the 2020 election (n = 1,280). Participants’ perceptions consistently underemphasized friction and overemphasized beliefs (mean d = 0.94). In participants’ open-text explanations, 91% of participants listed beliefs, compared with just 12% that listed friction. In contrast, turnout was shaped by beliefs only slightly more than friction. The actual belief-friction difference was about one-fourth the size of participants’ perceptions (d = 0.24). This bias emerged across a range of survey measures (open- and close-ended; other- and self-judgments) and was implicated in downstream consequences such as support for friction-imposing policies and failing to plan one’s vote. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9407209 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2022 |
publisher | National Academy of Sciences |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-94072092023-02-15 Americans discount the effect of friction on voter turnout Mazar, Asaf Tomaino, Geoff Carmon, Ziv Wood, Wendy Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A Social Sciences Whether or not someone turns out to vote depends on their beliefs (such as partisanship or sense of civic duty) and on friction—external barriers such as long travel distance to the polls. In this exploratory study, we tested whether people underestimate the effect of friction on turnout and overestimate the effect of beliefs. We surveyed a representative sample of eligible US voters before and after the 2020 election (n = 1,280). Participants’ perceptions consistently underemphasized friction and overemphasized beliefs (mean d = 0.94). In participants’ open-text explanations, 91% of participants listed beliefs, compared with just 12% that listed friction. In contrast, turnout was shaped by beliefs only slightly more than friction. The actual belief-friction difference was about one-fourth the size of participants’ perceptions (d = 0.24). This bias emerged across a range of survey measures (open- and close-ended; other- and self-judgments) and was implicated in downstream consequences such as support for friction-imposing policies and failing to plan one’s vote. National Academy of Sciences 2022-08-15 2022-08-23 /pmc/articles/PMC9407209/ /pubmed/35969772 http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2206072119 Text en Copyright © 2022 the Author(s). Published by PNAS. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/This article is distributed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License 4.0 (CC BY-NC-ND) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) . |
spellingShingle | Social Sciences Mazar, Asaf Tomaino, Geoff Carmon, Ziv Wood, Wendy Americans discount the effect of friction on voter turnout |
title | Americans discount the effect of friction on voter turnout |
title_full | Americans discount the effect of friction on voter turnout |
title_fullStr | Americans discount the effect of friction on voter turnout |
title_full_unstemmed | Americans discount the effect of friction on voter turnout |
title_short | Americans discount the effect of friction on voter turnout |
title_sort | americans discount the effect of friction on voter turnout |
topic | Social Sciences |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9407209/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35969772 http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2206072119 |
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