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The President's Party at the Midterm: An Aggregate and Individual-Level Analysis of Seat Loss and Vote Choice in U.S. House Elections

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Date Issued:
2013
Abstract/Description:
This thesis provides a comprehensive analysis of midterm U.S. House elections using a multi-level research design. At the aggregate-level, multiple regression analysis is used to examine the variables that affect seat loss for the president's party. This integrates, updates and extends the extant literature of the topic, and offers a means of explaining and predicting seat losses by the president's party in the U.S. House. To further probe the findings at the aggregate-level, the thesis develops a pooled cross-sectional model of individual-level vote choice in midterm U.S. House elections using data from the American National Election Studies (1982-2002) and the Cooperative Congressional Election Study for the 2006 and 2010 midterm elections. Findings suggest that variables measuring the performance of the economy and realignment of the South toward the Republican Party affect seat loss at the aggregate level. However, at the individual level, economic evaluations exerted little influence on vote choice, above and beyond party identification, although perceptions of the national economy did appear to influence vote choice in the 2006 and 2010 elections. Future research might incorporate the strategic politician thesis into the explanatory scheme and move the analysis to elections for other political offices, such as U.S. Senate elections as well as state legislative and gubernatorial elections.
Title: The President's Party at the Midterm: An Aggregate and Individual-Level Analysis of Seat Loss and Vote Choice in U.S. House Elections.
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Name(s): Macdonald, David, Author
Knuckey, Jonathan, Committee Chair
Ilderton, Nathan, Committee Member
Lanier, Drew, Committee Member
, Committee Member
University of Central Florida, Degree Grantor
Type of Resource: text
Date Issued: 2013
Publisher: University of Central Florida
Language(s): English
Abstract/Description: This thesis provides a comprehensive analysis of midterm U.S. House elections using a multi-level research design. At the aggregate-level, multiple regression analysis is used to examine the variables that affect seat loss for the president's party. This integrates, updates and extends the extant literature of the topic, and offers a means of explaining and predicting seat losses by the president's party in the U.S. House. To further probe the findings at the aggregate-level, the thesis develops a pooled cross-sectional model of individual-level vote choice in midterm U.S. House elections using data from the American National Election Studies (1982-2002) and the Cooperative Congressional Election Study for the 2006 and 2010 midterm elections. Findings suggest that variables measuring the performance of the economy and realignment of the South toward the Republican Party affect seat loss at the aggregate level. However, at the individual level, economic evaluations exerted little influence on vote choice, above and beyond party identification, although perceptions of the national economy did appear to influence vote choice in the 2006 and 2010 elections. Future research might incorporate the strategic politician thesis into the explanatory scheme and move the analysis to elections for other political offices, such as U.S. Senate elections as well as state legislative and gubernatorial elections.
Identifier: CFE0004883 (IID), ucf:49655 (fedora)
Note(s): 2013-08-01
M.A.
Sciences, Political Science
Masters
This record was generated from author submitted information.
Subject(s): midterm elections -- U.S. House of Representatives -- economy
Persistent Link to This Record: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004883
Restrictions on Access: public 2013-08-15
Host Institution: UCF

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