IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/socsci/v103y2022i3p607-621.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Party over preference? Strategic primary voting in the age of outsiders

Author

Listed:
  • Jarrod T. Kelly
  • Eric Loepp

Abstract

Objective Some primary voters cast their ballot for a candidate they do not most prefer in hopes that doing so will increase their party's chances of winning the general election. However, the emergence of party “outsider” candidates challenges prevailing assumptions about the persuasive pull of electability arguments on voter decision making. In this project, we analyze whether and when supporters of “outsider” candidates resolve strategic dilemmas relative to supporters of “insider” candidates. Methods We administer survey experiments to Republicans and Democrats immediately before the 2016 and 2020 primaries, respectively. Results Although voters in both parties are willing to vote strategically, there are critical differences when it comes to the loyalty primary voters feel to outsider primary candidates like Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. Conclusion Strategic voting decisions are not based merely on electability, particularly in the case of “outsider” candidates. Scholars should integrate additional factors into future work on voter behavior in primaries.

Suggested Citation

  • Jarrod T. Kelly & Eric Loepp, 2022. "Party over preference? Strategic primary voting in the age of outsiders," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 103(3), pages 607-621, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:socsci:v:103:y:2022:i:3:p:607-621
    DOI: 10.1111/ssqu.13138
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/ssqu.13138
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/ssqu.13138?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Shanto Iyengar & Sean J. Westwood, 2015. "Fear and Loathing Across Party Lines: New Evidence on Group Polarization," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 59(3), pages 690-707, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Mazen Hassan & Sarah Mansour & Stefan Voigt & May Gadallah, 2022. "When Syria was in Egypt’s land: Egyptians cooperate with Syrians, but less with each other," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 191(3), pages 337-362, June.
    2. Chonnakan Rittinon & Boontida Sa-ngimnet & Suparit Suwanik & Tanisa Tawichsri & Thiti Tosborvorn, 2022. "(I Think) I Don't Think Like You and I Don't Like You: Perception of Polarization and Out-Group Animosity," PIER Discussion Papers 194, Puey Ungphakorn Institute for Economic Research.
    3. Luca Henkel & Philipp Sprengholz & Lars Korn & Cornelia Betsch & Robert Böhm, 2022. "The Association Between Vaccination Status Identification and Societal Polarization," ECONtribute Discussion Papers Series 197, University of Bonn and University of Cologne, Germany.
    4. Joshua Conrad Jackson & Marieke van Egmond & Virginia K Choi & Carol R Ember & Jamin Halberstadt & Jovana Balanovic & Inger N Basker & Klaus Boehnke & Noemi Buki & Ronald Fischer & Marta Fulop & Ashle, 2019. "Ecological and cultural factors underlying the global distribution of prejudice," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(9), pages 1-17, September.
    5. Sgroi, Daniel & Yeo, Jonathan & Zhuo, Shi, 2021. "Ingroup Bias with Multiple Identities: The Case of Religion and Attitudes Towards Government Size," IZA Discussion Papers 14714, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Jetter, Michael & Walker, Jay K., 2022. "News coverage and mass shootings in the US," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).
    7. Michael Thaler, 2020. "The Fake News Effect: Experimentally Identifying Motivated Reasoning Using Trust in News," Papers 2012.01663, arXiv.org, revised May 2022.
    8. Sanjit Dhami & Emma Manifold & Ali al-Nowaihi, 2018. "Prosociality, Political Identity, and Redistribution of Earned Income: Theory and Evidence," CESifo Working Paper Series 7256, CESifo.
    9. Sanjit Dhami & Emma Manifold & Ali al‐Nowaihi, 2021. "Identity and Redistribution: Theory and Evidence," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 88(350), pages 499-531, April.
    10. Andras Molnar & Shereen J. Chaudhry & George Loewenstein, 2020. ""It's Not about the Money. It's about Sending a Message!" Unpacking the Components of Revenge," CESifo Working Paper Series 8102, CESifo.
    11. Helbling, Marc & Jungkunz, Sebastian, 2020. "Social divides in the age of globalization," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 43(6), pages 1187-1210.
    12. Adam Lovett, 2023. "The ethics of asymmetric politics," Politics, Philosophy & Economics, , vol. 22(1), pages 3-30, February.
    13. Voelkel, Jan G. & Stagnaro, Michael & Chu, James & Pink, Sophia Lerner & Mernyk, Joseph S. & Redekopp, Chrystal & Ghezae, Isaias & Cashman, Matthew & Adjodah, Dhaval & Allen, Levi, 2023. "Megastudy identifying effective interventions to strengthen Americans’ democratic attitudes," OSF Preprints y79u5, Center for Open Science.
    14. Vicky Chuqiao Yang & Tamara van der Does & Henrik Olsson, 2021. "Falling through the cracks: Modeling the formation of social category boundaries," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(3), pages 1-11, March.
    15. Yarrow Dunham & Antonio A. Arechar & David G. Rand, 2019. "From foe to friend and back again: The temporal dynamics of intra-party bias in the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election," Judgment and Decision Making, Society for Judgment and Decision Making, vol. 14(3), pages 373-380, May.
    16. Masha Krupenkin & David Rothschild & Shawndra Hill & Elad Yom-Tov, 2019. "President Trump Stress Disorder: Partisanship, Ethnicity, and Expressive Reporting of Mental Distress After the 2016 Election," SAGE Open, , vol. 9(1), pages 21582440198, March.
    17. Barriga, Alicia & Ferguson, Neil T. N. & Fiala, Nathan & Leroch, Martin Alois, 2020. "Ethnic cooperation and conflict in Kenya," Ruhr Economic Papers 872, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    18. Dhruv Chand Aggarwal, 2023. "The market for general counsel," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 20(4), pages 895-940, December.
    19. Jha, Anand & Boudreaux, Christopher J. & Banerjee, Vasabjit, 2018. "Political leanings and social capital," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 95-105.
    20. Paul Marx, 2019. "Should we study political behaviour as rituals? Towards a general micro theory of politics in everyday life," Rationality and Society, , vol. 31(3), pages 313-336, August.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:socsci:v:103:y:2022:i:3:p:607-621. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0038-4941 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.