Two Genes Predict Voter Turnout

Fowler, James H.; Dawes, Christopher T.

doi:10.2139/ssrn.1032632

Cited by 33 publications

(52 citation statements)

References 124 publications

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“…The most common, and as a result, one of the most researched forms of political participation is voting (Aldrich, 1993;Campbell, 1964;Fowler and Dawes, 2008;Gerber, Green and Larimer, 2008), which is why a significant portion of this manuscript will analyze the impact of living in a MGHH on voter turnout. For the national election subset of the data described above, each U.S. citizen over the age of 18 has a binary variable indicating whether or not they voted in that year's November election, and for the local election subset an individual reports how often they vote in local elections on an ordinal scale where the options are Never, Rarely, Sometimes, and Always.…”

Section: Measures Of Political and Civic Engagementmentioning

confidence: 99%

Traditional and Non-traditional Forms of Political Participation in Multigenerational Households

Hill¹

2020

Preprint

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The relationship between demographic trends and political participation is seldom overlooked, as even minute movements within the population can result in the systematic alteration of behavior among the American electorate. Throughout the past two decades, the United States has experienced consistent growth in the number of multigenerational households, seemingly correlated with cultural and economic changes across the country. According to one Census report, more than 4.3 million households, or roughly 5.6% of all households in the United States, are multigenerational. Surprisingly, the political behavior of such a significant demographic subgroup has yet to be analyzed in any meaningful way. It is unknown if and how such households differ from traditional households with regard to political participation and engagement. Using data from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series Current Population Survey (IPUMS-CPS) Voter Supplement for years 2000-2016 and Civic Engagement Supplement for the years of 2008-2011 and 2013, I am able to identify the individuals living in multigenerational households and assess their propensity to engage in a variety of political acts. Across a multitude of regression models and specifications of participation, I show that those living in multigenerational households participate at a significantly lower rate than those living in traditional households controlling for key demographics variables that have previously been shown to influence participation. Additionally, the panel structure of the IPUMS-CPS microdata creates the unique opportunity for a conditional differences-in-differences analysis with matching, so those who were not living in a multigenerational household at time t but were in time t + 1 can be compared to similar individuals who don't live in such a household in either time period. Those living in multigenerational households vote at a lower rate in presidential, midterm, and local elections, and are also less likely to engage in other forms of political engagement such as talking to family about politics, contacting an elected official, and being a part of organizations.while also explaining exactly why each subgroup participates at the observed rates (Brady, Verba and Schlozman, 1995;Dahan and Monogan, 2016;Gerber, Green and Larimer, 2008;Hopkins and Williamson, 2012;Rosenstone and Hansen, 1993). In order to do this, such literature must achieve two goals. First, identify the subgroups of people, usually based on groupings of similar demographic characteristics, that behave significantly different from one another, and second, uncover what actually causes these groups do behave as they do. Such knowledge is relevant not only for political scientists who desire to understand and explain how the political system works, but for politicians who are running for office or creating targeted policy to influence the behavior of specific people. (Green, 2015;Holbrook and McClurg, 2005).Being able to accurately determine which groups of people are more or less likely to parti...

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Section: Measures Of Political and Civic Engagementmentioning

confidence: 99%

Traditional and Non-traditional Forms of Political Participation in Multigenerational Households

Hill¹

2020

Preprint

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“…For example, the aforementioned AddHealth study, in addition to containing information on the zygosity status and questionnaire responses of ~1000 twin pairs, also contained limited genotype data for four neurotransmitter‐related genes for a subset of the study population. As noted, several political scientists used the Add Health dataset to estimate the heritability of voting on the basis of MZ and DZ twin pair responses to the question, ‘Did you vote in the last presidential election?’ In a representative CGA study, these same political scientists used responses to the same question to identify two polymorphisms they claimed were associated with voting . They reported that those who had a certain polymorphism of one gene (MAOA) answered ‘yes’ to this question more frequently than those who did not have this polymorphism.…”

Section: Gene Association Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A homolog is a gene similar in structure and origin to a gene in another species and is transcribed to produce a similar (or the same) protein . The MAOA gene, e.g., polymorphisms of which have been identified with voting behavior, has a homolog in nematodes. 5HTT, which has been associated with utilitarian moral reasoning, has homologs in zebrafish and frogs.…”

Section: Beyond the Dna Sequencementioning

confidence: 99%

“…All such studies stem from the so‐called ‘first law’ of behavior genetics, according to which ‘All human behavioral traits are heritable.’ Although the expression ‘human behavioral trait’ is not defined, behavior geneticists claim to have demonstrated the heritability of ‘behaviors’ as diverse as, e.g., texting on a cellphone (52% heritable), being a Born Again Christian (65% heritable), and being supportive of property taxes (41% heritable). Furthermore, they often claim to have identified, via ‘gene association’ studies, specific genes that underlie this heritability and can predict, e.g., voting in a presidential election, creative dance performance, and utilitarian moral judgments …”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Genes, behavior, and behavior genetics

Charney

2016

WIRES Cognitive Science

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According to the 'first law' of behavior genetics, 'All human behavioral traits are heritable.' Accepting the validity of this first law and employing statistical methods, researchers within psychology, sociology, political science, economics, and business claim to have demonstrated that all the behaviors studied by their disciplines are heritable-no matter how culturally specific these behaviors appear to be. Further, in many cases they claim to have identified specific genes that play a role in those behaviors. The validity of behavior genetics as a discipline depends upon the validity of the research methods used to justify such claims. It also depends, foundationally, upon certain key assumptions concerning the relationship between genotype (one's specific DNA sequences) and phenotype (any and all observable traits or characteristics). In this article, I examine-and find serious flaws with-both the methodologies of behavior genetics and the underlying assumptions concerning the genotype-phenotype relationship. WIREs Cogn Sci 2017, 8:e1405. doi: 10.1002/wcs.1405 For further resources related to this article, please visit the WIREs website.

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“…In particular, it contains data on age and gender. Both variables have been shown to predict turnout (Fowler and Dawes 2008). Moreover, there is a link between each and income.…”

Section: Measuring Segregation and Causal Inferencementioning

confidence: 99%

A Comparison of Aspatial and Spatial Measures of Segregation

Cohn¹,

Jackman²

2011

Transactions in GIS

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The modifiable areal unit problem arises when the boundaries that define neighborhoods affect perceived levels of segregation. Scholars postulate that this problem is exacerbated when one uses a definition of neighborhoods that is based on administrative units; doing so leads to an aspatial measure of segregation, which may or may not adequately account for the spatial relationships among residential locations. In this article, we assess whether aspatial and spatial definitions of neighborhoods produce different perceived levels of income segregation. Using an original individual-level dataset on income in San Mateo County, California, we define each individual's neighborhood in three ways -two aspatial and one spatial. On the basis of these definitions of neighborhoods, we then estimate residential income segregation using the local Moran's I statistic. We report two primary findings. First, the three measures generate different perceived levels of income segregation. Specifically, we observe less income segregation when using the aspatial measures as compared with the spatial one. Second, the inconsistencies between these measures are systematic in such a way as to lead to different inferences when used to predict individual voter turnout.

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Two Genes Predict Voter Turnout

Cited by 33 publications

References 124 publications

Traditional and Non-traditional Forms of Political Participation in Multigenerational Households

Traditional and Non-traditional Forms of Political Participation in Multigenerational Households

Genes, behavior, and behavior genetics

A Comparison of Aspatial and Spatial Measures of Segregation

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