Reevaluating the Influence of Leaders Under Proportional Representation : Quantitative Analysis of Text in an Electoral Experiment
Fredén, Annika LU and Sikström, Sverker LU
(2021)
In Frontiers in Psychology
12.
p.604135-604135
- Abstract
We propose that leaders play a more important role in voters' party sympathy in proportional representation systems (PR) than previous research has suggested. Voters, from the 2018 Swedish General Election, were in an experiment asked to describe leaders and parties with three indicative keywords. Statistical models were conducted on these text data to predict their vote choice. The results show that despite that the voters vote for a party, the descriptions of leaders predicted vote choice to a similar extent as descriptions of parties. However, the order of the questions mattered, so that the first questions were more predictive than the second question. These analyses indicate that voters tend to conflate characteristics of leaders... (More)
We propose that leaders play a more important role in voters' party sympathy in proportional representation systems (PR) than previous research has suggested. Voters, from the 2018 Swedish General Election, were in an experiment asked to describe leaders and parties with three indicative keywords. Statistical models were conducted on these text data to predict their vote choice. The results show that despite that the voters vote for a party, the descriptions of leaders predicted vote choice to a similar extent as descriptions of parties. However, the order of the questions mattered, so that the first questions were more predictive than the second question. These analyses indicate that voters tend to conflate characteristics of leaders with their parties during election campaigns, and that leaders are a more important aspect of voting under PR than previous literature has suggested. Overall, this suggests that statistical analysis of words sheds new light of underlying sympathies related to voting.
(Less)
- author
- Fredén, Annika
LU
and Sikström, Sverker
LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2021
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- leaders, parties, voting, primacy, proportional representation, statistical semantics
- in
- Frontiers in Psychology
- volume
- 12
- pages
- 604135 - 604135
- publisher
- Frontiers Media S. A.
- external identifiers
-
- scopus:85107042858
- pmid:34054637
- ISSN
- 1664-1078
- DOI
- 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.604135
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 66c78968-e00c-45c1-bcf9-130f424cd95b
- date added to LUP
- 2021-06-03 08:14:00
- date last changed
- 2025-01-13 09:00:22
@article{66c78968-e00c-45c1-bcf9-130f424cd95b,
abstract = {{<p>We propose that leaders play a more important role in voters' party sympathy in proportional representation systems (PR) than previous research has suggested. Voters, from the 2018 Swedish General Election, were in an experiment asked to describe leaders and parties with three indicative keywords. Statistical models were conducted on these text data to predict their vote choice. The results show that despite that the voters vote for a party, the descriptions of leaders predicted vote choice to a similar extent as descriptions of parties. However, the order of the questions mattered, so that the first questions were more predictive than the second question. These analyses indicate that voters tend to conflate characteristics of leaders with their parties during election campaigns, and that leaders are a more important aspect of voting under PR than previous literature has suggested. Overall, this suggests that statistical analysis of words sheds new light of underlying sympathies related to voting.</p>}},
author = {{Fredén, Annika and Sikström, Sverker}},
issn = {{1664-1078}},
keywords = {{leaders; parties; voting; primacy; proportional representation; statistical semantics}},
language = {{eng}},
pages = {{604135--604135}},
publisher = {{Frontiers Media S. A.}},
series = {{Frontiers in Psychology}},
title = {{Reevaluating the Influence of Leaders Under Proportional Representation : Quantitative Analysis of Text in an Electoral Experiment}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.604135}},
doi = {{10.3389/fpsyg.2021.604135}},
volume = {{12}},
year = {{2021}},
}