Predicting Presidential Performance in the United States: Equation Replication on Recent Survey Results

Abstract

For more than 2 decades, researchers have tried to identify the variables that predict the overall performance of U.S. presidents. In 1986, there emerged a 6-variable prediction equation (D. K. Simonton, 1986c, 1987b) that has been replicated repeatedly. The predictors are years in office, war years, scandal, assassination, heroism in war, and intellectual brilliance. The author again replicated the equation on recent rankings of all presidents from George Washington through William Jefferson Clinton according to a survey of 719 experts (W. R. Ridings, Jr., & S. B. McIver, 1997). The original 6-variable equation successfully predicted both the overall rankings as well as the 5 core components of the rankings (leadership qualities, accomplishment, political skill, appointments, character and integrity). The predictive value of the equation was illustrated for the presidencies of Ronald W. Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and Clinton.

Simple Method for Predicting American Presidential Greatness From Victory Margin in Popular Vote (1824-1996)

“…The overall rankings of the presidents from 1 (highest) to 41 (lowest) produced by Ridings and McIver (1997), which were based on the judgments of 719 expert survey respondents, served as the measure of presidential greatness. Simonton (2001) provided reliability and validity data to show that the Ridings and McIver variable is quite consistent with earlier presidential evaluations.…”

“…Although various response formats were used to produce the ratings and rankings, there is an extraordinary degree of consistency in the evaluations. Correlations between the various indexes of greatness usually have been in the .90s (Simonton, 1986a(Simonton, , 1987(Simonton, , 2001. Where samples of experts place presidents on the greatness continuum also has been found to be generally independent of rater characteristics and to correlate in an expected fashion with other indicators of presidential eminence (Simonton, 1987(Simonton, , 2001.…”

“…Multiple regression equations based on several personological, situational, and zeitgeist variables have been constructed that can predict presidential greatness ratings (Kenney & Rice, 1988;McCann, 1992;Simonton, 1986b). For example, Simonton (1986bSimonton ( , 2001) has found extensive support for a formula with the following six predictors: years in office, number of war years in office, presence or absence of top level scandal, whether the president was assassinated, whether the president was a national war hero before coming to office, and the intelligence of the president. In various replications through the years, the formula consistently has accounted for approximately 80% of the variance in presidential greatness variables.…”

Quantifying leader lives: What historiometric approaches can tell us

“…Simonton's (1988bSimonton's ( , 2001 work to differentiate U.S. Presidents in terms of rating and ranking performance data, respectively, represents a model intended to capture performance on a continuum, while Yammarino and colleagues' (2012) recent examination of predictors of assassination dichotomize the performance criterion (i.e., assassinated versus not). Each of these types of studies is intended to assess leadership characteristics related to some subsequent outcome (i.e., performance, assassination) and they provide some evidence as to the strength, direction, and robustness of these relationships.…”

Assessing prime-ministerial performance in a multiparty democracy: The Dutch case

“…In the United States, a cottage industry is devoted to this quest, trying to correlate a whole range of personal -IQ, EQ, absent fathers, birth order, prior careers, legislative experience, dying on the job and situational background variables -for example, variations in GNP, presence of crisis and war -or skills sets to presidents' places on the presidential greatness rankings (Nice, 1984;Simonton, 1987Simonton, , 2001Simonton, , 2006Ones et al, 2004). To our knowledge, in parliamentary systems no such research has been conducted to date.…”