Doctoral Dissertation in Research: Information and Political Participation: Evidence from Field Experiments

人们投票是出于结果主义的原因，还是出于非结果主义的原因，还是两者兼而有之？政治经济学的大量理论研究假设，个人投票是为了影响选举的结果。在这些模型中，个人应该更有可能在选举接近时投票。另一方面，一个人真正在选举中发挥关键作用的可能性微乎其微。如果结果主义是政治参与的主要动机，我们应该会看到投票率非常低。虽然研究人员检查了观测数据，但混淆使从这些数据中得出结论变得困难。这项研究使用了一种实验方法，在这种方法中，我们测试告知人们选举的接近程度是否会影响投票率。根据这些模型，当选举接近时，个人应该更有可能投票。如果我们的发现不支持这些模型，那么研究可能会开发出个人具有非结果主义(例如，情感、社会规范等)的模型。政治参与的动机。这项研究的更广泛的影响包括在增加民主参与以及在政治学和经济学之间建立智力桥梁方面增加现有的“什么是有效的”知识。

Do people vote for consequentialist reasons, for non-consequentialist reasons, or both? A large body of theoretical research in political economy assumes that individuals vote in order to affect the outcome of an election. In these models, individuals should be more likely to turn out when the election is close. On the other hand, the chances of an individual actually being pivotal in an election is vanishingly small. If consequentialism were the primary motivation for political participation, we should see very low levels of turnout. While researchers have examined observational data, confounds make conclusions from this data difficult.This research uses an experimental methodology in which we test whether informing people about the closeness of the election affects turnout. According to these models, individuals should be more likely to vote when the election is close. If our findings do not support these models, then research might develop models where individuals have non-consequentialist (e.g. emotional, social norm, ...) motivations for political participation.The broader impacts of the study include adding to existing knowledge about "what works" in increasing democratic participation, and in building intellectual bridges between political science and economics.