It's a Group Thing: How Voters go to the Polls Together

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

Documents

Across European Parliament, local and general elections in Denmark between half and three quarters of voters in households with multiple voters cast their vote within a minute of another household member. This finding, revealed using data from a time-stamped voter panel covering more than two million Danish voters, establishes that many families visit the polling station together. The result are replicated using survey data from Denmark, the UK and a range of other countries, indicating that voting together is a widespread phenomenon, supporting the characterization of voting as a social act. For the first time our analysis reveals that acquiring a potential voting partner increases turnout, whilst losing one decreases turnout.

Original languageEnglish
JournalPolitical Behavior
Volume42
Issue number1
Pages (from-to)1-34
Number of pages34
ISSN0190-9320
Publication statusPublished - Mar 2020

    Research areas

  • Turnout, Social norms, Political participation, UK, Denmark, TURNOUT, FAMILY, PARTICIPATION, MOBILIZATION, HOUSEHOLD, CONTEXT

Number of downloads are based on statistics from Google Scholar and www.ku.dk


No data available

ID: 249820609