Voter Turnout

Knowledge of candidate’s issues, sense of civic duty and overall displeasure with our current president. Those are some of the main factors contributing to voter turnout. I believe that voter turnout is fundamental to a healthy democracy. With this being a political analysis class, I felt that my topic of choice was very interesting and I was very curious to develop the preliminary outcomes. Voter turnout is usually attributed to political disengagement and the belief that voting for one candidate, party or another will do little to change public policy. I found the topic very interesting in the fact that the numbers tell all. In the last presidential election in 2012, only 60.4 percent of the voting age population voted. Despite the central
Where advertisers can afford them and political circumstances enable, TV commercials are usually the method of first choice, the most visible sign of activity and the most expensive aspect of campaigns. Candidates, parties, and groups combined to spend at least $1.6 billion on TV ads in 2004 (Memmot and Drinkard 2004). Freedman and Goldstein’s in 1999 conducted a study of voters found that exposure to ads increased turnout, but the total number of campaign ads aired in one’s media market had no impact on turnout. A modern presidential campaign spends over one billion dollars to run hundreds of thousands of television advertisements and attempt hundreds of millions of individual voter contacts. In both studies, the impact of TV advertising is especially strong for certain segments of the population, but the average effect across the whole sample remains substantial. No campaign can afford to advertise everywhere, but the boundaries of media markets discourage their efforts to distribute their resources with maximum efficiency. According to the National Annenberg Election Study, around 67% of respondents had selected a candidate by September, two full months before the election. Research has shown that voters pay attention to new information even after making an initial selection. I found this very interesting in the fact that as voters we may
This new survey commissioned by MGH, an integrated marketing communications agency, found that 32 percent of survey respondents change the channel as soon as a political advertisement airs and during political news coverage, and nearly half (47 percent) of viewers will change the channel or mute the TV during a negative political ad. The vast majority, 88 percent of survey respondents said they are turned off by negative political advertising. I found these numbers staggering. Additionally, when looking at the age breakdown of younger voters aged 18 - 24, the survey found slightly higher percentages: Forty-five percent change the channel during political news coverage. Thirty-nine percent change the channel as soon as they see a political advertisement. Scholars argue that exposure to campaign advertising boosts turnout by providing voter with campaign information and heightening voter’s interest in the election. However experimental studies have shown that negative ads shrink the body of voters by angering voters and increasing their doubt about the process. According to MGH President Andy Malis. "During election years, television advertising space is limited and more expensive, so advertisers need to get creative and integrated with their media campaigns to ensure their message is getting through the clutter." MGH