麻豆影院

Answer, not so much, according to a trio of researchers including CU 麻豆影院 political scientist

During a campaign stop in Iowa in 2016, now-President Donald Trump famously told his supporters: "I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose voters."听

Though the 2016 presidential election is behind us, Trump鈥檚 claim illustrates a major question that persists in modern-day politics: whether or not voters are willing to hold their elected representatives accountable for their actions.听

New research from a trio of researchers, including one from the 麻豆影院, sheds some light on this pertinent issue. The paper, titled 鈥淎 God of Vengeance and of Reward? Voters and Accountability,鈥� was published in听听in November 2018 and found that voters are more likely to reward their representatives than punish them for their actions.

鈥淭he question of whether voters hold elected officials accountable is right at the heart of our democracy,鈥� said John Griffin, a CU 麻豆影院 associate professor of political science. 鈥淭here had been a number of studies that provided some evidence on that question, but I wanted to examine it in a way that I thought would be more convincing.鈥�

More specifically, the researchers sought to understand how voters would react when they learned how closely their own policy preferences aligned with their elected leaders鈥� actual voting decisions on real issues.

Griffin partnered with Brian Newman, a professor of political science at Pepperdine University, and David Nickerson, an associate professor of political science and public policy at Temple University.

The question of accountability dates back to our nation鈥檚 founding and is built into the design of the Constitution. Though the founding fathers attempted to address this issue more than 200 years ago, it remains top of mind in today鈥檚 political climate.

鈥淪tarting with the founders, many have thought that citizens ought to reward and punish their elected representatives for their actions in office,鈥� Newman said. 鈥淩ecently, many are wondering whether party polarization is so powerful that Republicans will support and Democrats will oppose Republican officials no matter what they do.鈥澨�

Using a short survey, researchers asked a random sample of more than 2,300 people how they felt about five political issues ranging from abortion to unemployment benefits. The issues were actually bills that members of the U.S. House of Representatives had already voted on, but the researchers did not tell the survey participants that.听

If you like what your member of Congress does, you鈥檙e more likely to reward them. But if you dislike what your member does, we didn鈥檛 find a lot of evidence of punishment of them.鈥�
鈥擩ohn Griffin

The researchers carefully selected the five political issues based on certain factors鈥攈ow meaningful the issue would be to most voters, whether or not it was a divisive issue for one or both political parties (i.e., not a party-line vote), the number of abstentions on the vote and how balanced the five issues would be when taken together.

After gleaning how the survey respondents felt about the issues, the researchers then used the participants鈥� ZIP codes to look up how their representative had actually voted on each matter. They created a so-called 鈥渃ongruence score鈥� to indicate how closely the participants鈥� feelings aligned with their representatives鈥� votes.

The researchers shared this congruence score, as well as the name and party affiliation of the voter鈥檚 representative, with a random half of the survey respondents. They informed the other random half of respondents of their representative鈥檚 name and party affiliation only.

After that, the researchers asked the survey participants how they felt about their representative鈥檚 job performance, whether they intended to vote for the representative in the future and how likely they were to participate in the upcoming election at all.

The findings suggest that informing voters of how closely their views align with their representatives鈥� voting decisions changes how they feel about their representative and might also affect their likelihood of voting in upcoming elections.

鈥淭he main finding was largely corroborative of prior studies:听When we told voters how well their policy preferences lined up with their member of Congress, those people with听high congruency听tended to like their member of Congress more and say they would be more likely to vote for them in the next election听compared to voters who didn't get any information about congruency,鈥� Griffin said.

One surprising finding is that voters are more inclined to reward their representative (by way of voting for them in an upcoming election) than they are to punish them.

Starting with the founders, many have thought that citizens ought to reward and punish their elected representatives for their actions in office. Recently, many are wondering whether party polarization is so powerful that Republicans will support and Democrats will oppose Republican officials no matter what they do.鈥澨�
鈥擝rian Newman

鈥淚f you like what your member of Congress does, you鈥檙e more likely to reward them,鈥� Griffin added. 鈥淏ut if you dislike what your member does, we didn鈥檛 find a lot of evidence of punishment of them.鈥�

The study also provides some evidence for just how much congruency voters expect from their representatives鈥攊n other words, what percentage of votes need to align in order for voters to be happy with their representative?

鈥淲hat our study suggested is that something north of 50 percent is sufficient in order to gain someone鈥檚 approval,鈥� Griffin said. 鈥淚t doesn鈥檛 have to get anywhere close to full agreement.鈥�

The data also showed that voters who had high congruency and, to some extent, low congruency with their representative were more likely to participate in the next election at all鈥攖hose who agreed with their representative might turn out to vote to show their support, while those who disagreed with their representative might participate in the election to vote for a challenger.听

Griffin pointed out that this finding deserves further exploration, as there weren鈥檛 many survey participants who had extremely low levels of agreement with their representative. Future studies could look at heterogeneous districts, where it would be impossible for representatives to align their votes with all of their constituents all the time.

The research reinforces the fact that it's beneficial for representatives to make sure their votes align with the views of their constituents鈥攖hat they should literally try to represent voters in their district.听

And since voters appear to reward their representatives more than they punish them, the findings could provide an explanation as to why so many political campaigns rely on personal attacks, rather than pointing out policy incongruencies to voters, Griffin said.听

During a time when misinformation and 鈥渇ake news鈥� are popular discussion topics, the findings also highlight the importance of voters receiving accurate information about their elected officials, Newman said.

One big-picture takeaway from the study? Every now and then, it鈥檚 important to take a step back and question our long-held beliefs or ideas. While voters might assume that our democracy is working as intended, it鈥檚 the role of social scientists to probe deeper and provide a more nuanced understanding of things we think we already know, Griffin said.

鈥淲hat academics sometimes do is take intuitions or conclusions that we all think are true and help shed light on why they鈥檙e true, the mechanisms by which those phenomena happen or to establish the boundaries of them鈥攚hen do they happen and when don鈥檛 they happen?鈥� Griffin said.

听