Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-xbtfd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-04T18:15:36.684Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Weather, Risk, and Voting: An Experimental Analysis of the Effect of Weather on Vote Choice

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 June 2018

Anna Bassi*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, NC, USA, e-mail: anna.bassi@unc.edu

Abstract

A number of theoretical and empirical studies analyze the effect of inclement weather on voter turnout and in turn on parties’ vote share. However, empirical findings suggest that the effect of weather on parties’ vote share is greater than can be explained by its influence on voter turnout alone. This article provides experimental evidence of the effect of weather on vote choice between more- versus less-risky candidates. Findings show that bad weather significantly and sizeably depresses risk tolerance making voters less likely to vote for risky candidates. This article also provides evidence of a possible mechanism: unpleasant weather conditions depress agents’ mood, making agents less inclined to vote for candidates who are perceived as more risky.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Experimental Research Section of the American Political Science Association 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

An earlier version of this paper has previously circulated as “The indian rain dance of the incumbent. The effect of weather beyond turnout.” I am grateful to Daniel Butler, Riccardo Colacito, Paolo Fulghieri, Andrew Healy, Luke Keele, Neil Malhotra, Dan Myers, Michael MacKuen, Torrey Shineman, Dave Siegel, Jim Stimson, Alex Theodoridis, Agnieszka Tymula, Jon Woon, the editors Eric Dickson and Rick Wilson, and three anonymous reviewers for their useful comments. I would like to thank the seminar’s participants at the 2012 Midwest Political Science Association, 2013 Southern Political Science Association, 2013 American Political Science Association, 2013 Economic Science Association, the 6th Annual NYU-CESS Experimental Political Science Conference, and the 2014 Behavioral Models of Politics Conference for providing valuable feedback. All errors remain my own. The data, code, and any additional materials required to replicate all analyses in this article are available at the Journal of Experimental Political Science Dataverse within the Harvard Dataverse Network, at doi:10.7910/DVN/CVXOOS (Bassi, 2018). The experiment was approved by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Institutional Review Board (Study #11-0389).

References

REFERENCES

Bassi, A. 2018. “Replication Data for: Weather, Risk, and Voting: An Experimental Analysis of the Effect of Weather on Vote Choice.” Harvard Dataverse, V1. doi:10.7910/DVN/CVXOOS.Google Scholar
Bassi, A., Colacito, R., and Fulghieri, P.. 2013. “'O Sole Mio: An Experimental Analysis of Weather and Risk Attitudes in Financial Decisions.” Review of Financial Studies 26 (7): 1824–52.Google Scholar
Bernhardt, M. D. and Ingerman, D. E.. 1985. “Candidate Reputations and the ‘incumbency effect’.” Journal of Public Economics 27 (1): 4767.Google Scholar
DeNardo, J. 1980. “Turnout and the Vote: The Joke’s on the Democrats.” The American Political Science Review 74 (2): 406–20.Google Scholar
Gomez, B. T., Hansford, T. G., and Krause, G. A.. 2007. “The Republicans Should Pray for Rain: Weather, Turnout, and Voting in US Presidential Elections.” The Journal of Politics 69 (3): 647–61.Google Scholar
Hirshleifer, D. and Shumway, T. 2003. “Good Day Sunshine: Stock Returns and the Weather.” Journal of Finance 58: 1009–32.Google Scholar
Holt, C. A. and Laury, S. K.. 2002. “Risk Aversion and Incentive Effects.” The American Economic Review 92 (5): 1644–55.Google Scholar
Horiuchi, Y. and Kang, W. C.. 2018. “Why Should the Republicans Pray for Rain? The Electoral Consequences of Rainfall Revisited.” American Politics Research, forthcoming.Google Scholar
Isen, A. 2000. “Positive Affect and Decision Making.” In Handbook of Emotions, eds. Lewis, M. and Haviland-Jones, J.. New York, NY: Guilford Press, 417–35.Google Scholar
Kahneman, D. and Tversky, A.. 1979. “Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Choice Under Risk.” Econometrica 47 (2): 263–91.Google Scholar
Kamstra, M. J., Kramer, L. A., and Levi, M. D.. 2003. “Winter Blues: ASAD Stock Market Cycle.” The American Economic Review 93: 324–43.Google Scholar
Knack, S. 1994. “Does Rain Help the Republicans? Theory and Evidence on Turnout and the Vote.” Public Choice 79: 187209.Google Scholar
Kramer, L. A. and Weber, J. M.. 2012. “This is Your Portfolio on Winter: Seasonal Affective Disorder and Risk Aversion in Financial Decision Making.” Social Psychology and Personality Science 3: 193–9.Google Scholar
Laury, S. K. and Holt, C. A.. 2008. “Further Reflections on Prospect Theory.” In Risk Aversion in Experiments. Research in Experimental Economics, vol. 12, eds. Cox, J. C. and Harrison, G. W.. Bingley, UK: Emerald, 405–40.Google Scholar
Ludlum, D. M. 1984. The Weather Factor. Boston, MA: American Meteorological Society.Google Scholar
MacKuen, M. B., Erikson, R. S., and Stimson, J. A.. 1992. “Peasants or Bankers? The American Electorate and the US Economy.” American Political Science Review 86: 597611.Google Scholar
Morgenstern, S. and Zechmeister, E.. 2001. “Better the Devil You Know Than the Saint You Don’t: Risk Propensity and Vote Choice in Mexico.” The Journal of Politics 63 (1): 93119.Google Scholar
Nadeau, R., Martin, P., and Blais, A.. 1999. “Attitude towards Risk-Taking and Individual Choice in the Quebec Referendum on Sovereignty.” British Journal of Political Science 29: 523–39.Google Scholar
Palfrey, T. R. and Poole, K. T.. 1987. “The Relationship between Information, Ideology, and Voting Behavior.” American Journal of Political Science 31 (3): 511–30.Google Scholar
Quattrone, G. A. and Tversky, A.. 1988. “Contrasting Rational and Psychological Analyses of Political Choice.” American Political Science Review 82 (3): 719–36.Google Scholar
Sanders, J. L. and Brizzolara, M. S.. 1982. “Relationships between Weather and Mood.” Journal of General Psychology 107: 155–6.Google Scholar
Shepsle, K. A. 1972. “The Strategy of Ambiguity: Uncertainty and Electoral Competition.” American Political Science Review 66: 555–68.Google Scholar
Tomz, M. and Van Houweling, R. P.. 2009. “The Electoral Implications of Candidate Ambiguity.” American Political Science Review 103 (1): 8398.Google Scholar
Wright, W. F. and Bower, G. H.. 1992. “Mood Effects on Subjective Probability Assessment.” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 52: 276–91.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: Link
Link
Supplementary material: PDF

Bassi supplementary material

Bassi supplementary material 1

Download Bassi supplementary material(PDF)
PDF 771.3 KB