Ballot Photographs as Cues in Low‐Information Elections

Abstract

Normative democratic theory requires voters to be informed when choosing between candidates, but this expectation runs counter to the empirical research showing that voters tend to be ill informed about candidate and party positions on issues. Nevertheless, a large body of research demonstrates that voters can compensate for a lack of information by using cognitive shortcuts in making voting

Better not look too nice? Employees' preferences towards (un)likeable managers

“…ii Following the 'truth of consensus' method (Banducci et al, 2008;Benjamin and Shapiro, 2009;Poutvaara et al, 2009), we calculated the average of the independent evaluations across raters for every picture.…”

Pretty faces, marginal races: Predicting election outcomes using trait assessments of British parliamentary candidates

“…As the ties between voters and parties' policy positions weaken, scholars of British politics increasingly point to the role of non-policy characteristics, such as competence or experience, in the electoral process (e.g., Clarke et al, 2004Green and Hobolt, 2008;Clark, 2009). While much of the literature stresses the non-policy traits of parties, there is also an emerging literature focusing on the non-policy traits of British candidates (e.g., Shephard, 2007, 2011;Banducci et al, 2008;Buttice and Milazzo, 2011).…”

“…While our study is the first study to connect rapidly-determined perceptions of candidate traits to general electoral outcomes in Great Britain, our findings are consistent with a growing literature documenting a relationship between perceptions of candidate traits and voting behaviour in candidate-centric systems such as Brazil (Lawson et al, 2010), Finland (Berggren, Jordahl, and Poutvaara 2010), Ireland (Buckleye et al, 2007), and the United States (e.g., Todorov et al 2005;Benjamin and Shapiro, 2009;Hayes, 2010), as well as an increasing number of more party-centred systems, including Australia (King and Leigh, 2009), Canada (Efron and Patterson, 1974), France (Antonakis and Dalgas, 2009), Germany (Rosar et al, 2008), Great Britain (e.g., Shephard, 2007, 2011;Banducci et al, 2008), and Switzerland (Lutz, 2009). …”

Facial Cues to Perceived Height Influence Leadership Choices in Simulated War and Peace Contexts

“…Leadership judgments made from faces of unfamiliar political candidates have predicted real election outcomes in American congressional, gubernatorial, and presidential races (Armstrong, Green, Jones, and Wright, 2010;Ballew and Todorov, 2007;Todorov, Mandisodza, Goren, and Hall, 2005), as well as federal election outcomes in Canada , the United Kingdom (Banducci, Karp, Thrasher, and Rallings, 2008;Little, Burriss, Jones, and Roberts, 2007), Australia (Martin, 1978), Ireland (Buckley, Collins, and Reidy, 2007), Italy (Castelli, Carraro, Ghitti, and Pastore, 2009) and Japan . Facial cues to leadership ability are even recognized by children, whose judgments closely match those made by adults (Antonakis and Dalgas, 2009).…”