POLI 311

The Effect of Fact-Checking on Elites (Nyhan and Reifler)

Field Experiment Randomly assigned subset of state legislators were sent series of letters about risks to reputation and electoral security if caught making questionable statements. Legislators who were sent these letters were less likely to receive negative fact-checking rating or to have accuracy questioned publicly. fact-checking can reduce inaccuracy when poses salient threat.

Size

Population size. Influences things such as money allocation, who votes, political organizations, who runs for office, etc.

The Ideological Mapping of American Legislatures (Shor and McCarty)

Spatial Theory of Voting Obtained roll call voting data for all state legislatures from the mid-1990s onward. Exploit a recurring survey of state legislative candidates to allow comparisons across time, chambers, states, and U.S. Congress. mapping of America's state legislatures can address many questions about state politics and policy making. Documents key regularities of party positioning and ideological conflict in American states. Political parties below national level are heterogenous. State legislative medians correlate highly with voter ideology measures. States follow the national pattern of high and growing polarization.

States as Laboratories: A Reprise (Morehouse and Malcolm)

States are laboratories and have new agenda of social experimentation. Studies every possible state institution I swear. State political parties are growing more important and have a major impact on making policy. State politics, parties, and policies are closely intertwined.

Field experimental work on political institutions (Grose)

Studies why field experiments are used infrequently when studying political institutions. Notes that some research questions do not work with field experiments. Concludes that political science could benefit from more experimental work.

Gender Roles, Work-life Balance, and Running for Office (Silbermann)

Time spent traveling to and from work is burdensome for those whocare for children. Women are less likely to run for state legislative office in districts further from state capitals. Female students weight proximity to home twice as heavily as male students do in hypothetical decision of whether or not to run for office. Equal representation of women would require men and women to share equal responsibility of household matters.

Scope

Democracy's capacity for action. Can be determined by extent to which powers are distributed among elected officials. Examples of Scope: small scope = school board, local fire and police, etc. Large scope = social programs.

Experimentation in Political Science (Morton and Williams)

Experiments have increased dramatically in political science because of power for making causal inferences. Directly confronts external validity. External validity can be achieved if a result can be replicated across a variety of data-sets and situations. Application of experiment techniques will rise in political science.

How do Citizens React When Politicians Support Policies They Oppose? (Brookcman and Butler)

Explores how constituents react when legislators take positions they oppose. State legislators sent constituents official communications with randomly assigned content. Some letters reps took positions on salient issues constituents opposed (some with explanation some without). Did telephone survey after fact. Citizens often adopted representatives' issue positions even with little justification. Did not evaluate representatives more negatively when took positions they opposed. Lots of room to shape public opinion

How to Elect More Women: Gender and Candidate Success in a Field Experiment (Karpowitz, Monson, Preece)

Field experiment Increase women's electoral success through political party leaders efforts. Recruit or encourage to vote for women. Efforts affect number of women elected as delegates. Simple interventions can affect behavior of candidates and voters.

Can Learning Constituency Opinion Affect How Legislators Vote? (Butler and Nickerson)

Field experiment Surveyed 10690 New Mexicans about Governor's spending proposals. District specific survey results shared with randomly selected half of legislature. Legislators receiving district-specific survey results were much more likely to vote in line with constituent opinion. Legislators want to be more responsive to public opinion than they are in their natural state.

A Field Experiment on Legislators' Home Styles: Service versus Policy. (Butler, Karpowitz, and Pope)

Field experiment with 1000 letters sent by individuals to 500 different legislative offices. Testing whether legislative offices prioritize service over policy in their home style. Both state and federal offices are more responsive to service requests than to policy requests. Desire of legislators to gain leeway with constituents in order to pursue own policy goals. Decision to prioritize service occurs in how office is structured.

Bias

How governments allocate resources in a fair way. High bias = unequal allocation. Low bias = equal allocation.

Multidimensional Responsiveness: The Determinants of Legislator's Representational Priorities (Harden)

Policy is only one of several dimensions through which legislators provide representation. Legislative institutions, district demand, and individual traits structure legislators' strategic representational priorities.

How Politicians Discount the Opinions of Constituents with Whom They Disagree (Butler and Dynes)

Politicians discount opinions of constituents they disagree with which contributes to ideological incongruence. survey experiments public officials rationalize behavior by assuming constituents with opposing views are less informed. bias is exacerbated by taking and explaining one's policy positions.

How Not to Increase Participation in Local Government: The Advantages of Experiments When Testing Policy Interventions (Arceneaux and Butler)

Randomized Survey Experiment. Evaluated relative effectiveness of offering social recognition or skills training for economically disadvantaged citizens in regards to non elected committees. Entreaties to participate had no effect on willingness to participate. Often decreased willingness to participate.

Measuring Constituent Policy Preferences in Congress, State Legislatures, and Cities (Tausanovitch and Warshaw)

Scale policy preferences of 275,000 Americans based on responses to policy questions. Estimate preferences of every state, congressional district, state legislative district, and large city. Estimates outperform previous measures. Examine representation at variety of geographic levels.

Do Politicians Racially Discriminate Against Constituents? (Butler, Brookcman)

Use field experiment. Sent email to each legislator and randomized whether a black or white alias was used as well as whether o the email signaled sender's partisan preference. Find that black requests receive fewer replies.

Representation in Municipal Government

Use recent advances in opinion estimation to measure mean policy conservatism in every U.S. city and town with population above 20,000 people. Policies enacted by cities correspond with liberal-conservative positions of their citizens on national policy issues. Institutions have little consistent impact on policy responsiveness in municipal government. Demonstrate role for citizen policy preferences in determining municipal policy outcomes Cast doubt that simple institutional reforms enhance responsiveness in municipal governments.

Partisan Power Play: The Origins of Local Election Timing as an American Political Institution (Anzia)

Voter turnout in off-cycle elections is far lower than turnout in local elections held concurrently with state and national elections. Timing of city elections important determinant of voter turnout. American political parties regularly manipulate timing of city elections to secure an edge over rivals.

Internal Validity

Whether or not it is valid to draw a causal conclusion from the results of the study.

Construct Validity

Whether or not the components of the experiment represent or apply to the components from the theory that the experiment is claiming to test (e.g. whether Jake and DeShawn are good race indicators or if they imply something else).

External Validity

Whether or not the findings from the experiment apply more generally to other settings and subjects outside of the current study.