For work by Yale professors Donald Green and Alan Gerber, please visit the past grants page.

Years 1-2

1. "Generations, Agendas, and Participation"
Principal Investigator: J. Merrill Shanks, UC, Berkeley; Co-Principal Investigator: Henry Brady, UC, Berkeley

Years 3-4

2.."The Political Potential of Online Deliberative Dialogue"
Principal Investigators: Constance Flanagan, Penn State University and James Knauer, Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania  

3."Immigrant Political Incorporation in the U.S.: Mobilizing Ethnic Group Consciousness"
Principal Investigator: Jane Junn, Rutgers University

4. "Political Participation of Native Americans Aged 18-25 on South Dakota Reservations"
Principal Investigator: Jill Ireland, University of South Dakota, Masters Candidate

5. "Impact of Trade Union Youth Programs on Young Workers' Political Engagement and Participation"
Principal Investigators: Nancy Brown Johnson & Paul Jarley, University of Kentuck

6. "Political Ad Exposure, the Internet, and Participation: A Campaign Communication Mediation Model"
Principal Investigators: Dhavan V. Shah and Douglas M. McLeod, University of Wisconsin, Madison

2005 Election: Randomized Experiments

7. "Voter Mobilization by Absentee Ballot Recruitment"
Principal Investigator: Christopher B. Mann, Doctoral Candidate, Yale University

8."Young Democrats of America"
Principal Investigator: David W. Nickerson, University of Notre Dame

9. "Randomized Field Experiment in New Jersey and Virginia"
Principal Investigator: Tim Vercellotti, Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

"Generations, Agendas, and Participation"

Principal Investigator: J. Merrill Shanks, UC, Berkeley; Co-Principal Investigator: Henry Brady, UC, Berkeley

While it is clear that youth participation in the political process is lower than participation among older Americans, it is not yet clear why this is so or how to change the situation. This project looks at agenda-related differences among youth and between youth and their elders. Taking data from the 2001 Public Agendas and Citizen Engagement Survey and other national studies, this project investigates three potential divisions that may impact participation. First, engagement may depend on the political concerns of youth. Second, these concerns may be different from those of adults either because of a generational change or because they are issues typical of youth which will change as this cohort ages. Third, the cleavages along demographic lines such as race or gender may be more or less evident than those cleavages among older Americans. The next portion of this project uses these results to model the effects of increased youth participation on the nation's political agendas.

"The Political Potential of Online Deliberative Dialogue"

Principal Investigators: Constance Flanagan, Penn State University and James Knauer, Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania

This project will assess whether there are gains in undergraduate students' political knowledge, interest, and perspective taking as a result of their participation in an asynchronous online deliberation using an adaptation of the National Issues Forum, By the People: Americans' Role in the World. The online deliberations are organized and coordinated by the Pennsylvania Center for Civic Life at Lock Haven University. Compared to face-to-face deliberations, online deliberative groups have the potential to introduce students to a broad range of perspectives and participants because geographic proximity is not the basis for the grouping. In this project students from a wide range of undergraduate institutions across the United States (community colleges, historically Black colleges, 4-year undergraduate) are assigned to on-line moderated groups for twelve weeks of dialogue. The project will do content and outcome analyses of the dialogues to determine whether individuals seek political knowledge, consider the perspectives of others, accommodate their views, and commit to political action during the course of the twelve weeks. A second goal of the project is to determine group level and moderating practices that maximize dialogue rather than debate and that help the members develop a sense of themselves as a public ready to take political action.

"Immigrant Political Incorporation in the U.S.: Mobilizing Ethnic Group Consciousness"

Principal Investigator: Jane Junn, Rutgers University

On any weekend between early spring and late fall in New York City, one can witness a celebration of identity marching on Fifth or Madison Avenues. "Kiss Me I'm Irish" buttons mark the beginning of the season of the mass display of group identification at the most venerable of parades on St. Patrick's Day. While New York City is unique in many ways, similar organized displays of national, ethnic and racial identity are enacted in communities across the United States. The group compositions and labels vary, but the imperative of publicly claiming identities remains the same. New patterns of international migration to the United States, overwhelmingly from sending countries in Latin America and Asia, foreshadow the development of a democratic politics organized around a new racial pluralism. The presence of a critical mass of racial minorities signals the possibility that disadvantaged groups can better mobilize individuals and increase their input in democratic politics. Foregrounded in this way, it seems reasonable to hope and expect that a shared sense of racial and/or ethnic identity will have political consequences and predict, among other things, higher levels of political participation among those who are so identified. But does it? There is only sporadic evidence that Blacks, Latinos and Asians have racial and ethnic identities with political kick. Under what circumstances does ethnic and racial identity have political consequences?

This project attempts to shed light on these questions by studying what influences ethnic and racial consciousness among minority Americans, and in particular among immigrants and those individuals who consider themselves to be "multi-racial." The inferential focus of the study is on how ethnic and racial identification can be used to mobilize political participation among minority and immigrant youth in the United States, and the research has three main goals: to better understand the content and contours of ethnic and racial identification among Asian American, Latino, and Black youth; to more systematically observe the circumstances under which ethnic and racial identification has political content; and to help reveal more precisely how this identification can be politicized and mobilized to increase voting and political participation among youth. The project data collection is designed to observe how variations in the social context and political message alter the extent to which group consciousness is manifested, and then, how this racial and ethnic group consciousness mobilizes individual political action. The study design incorporates methods of data collection in the form of in-depth interviews, self-reported survey response, and observation of attitudinal and behavioral differences in experimental design settings.

"Political Participation of Native Americans Aged 18-25 on South Dakota Reservations"

Principal Investigator: Jill Ireland, University of South Dakota, Masters Candidate

This research will assess the political participation of Native Americans aged 18-25 on South Dakota Indian Reservations. The project goal is to ascertain voter participation and electoral engagement in elections for
Native Americans aged 18-25, and to examine different forms of political participation. The findings of this study will identify the barriers to electoral participation, which will help provide information for civic groups to use to increase participation and electoral engagement.

This research focuses on youth aged 18-25 on reservations. The 2000 Census Bureau data shows the median age of South Dakota Native Americans on Reservations to be almost 10 years younger than the
South Dakota median age. Due to the large number of Native Americans in the 18-25 age group, electoral majorities would have to come from this age group. With so many youth on reservations as a percentage of the population, it is important to look at their electoral
engagement.

"Impact of Trade Union Youth Programs on Young Workers' Political Engagement and Participation"

Principal Investigators: Nancy Brown Johnson & Paul Jarley, University of Kentucky

We will examine the impact of trade union youth programs on young workers' (ages 14 to 25) political engagement and participation. The central hypothesis is that these programs can serve to build young workers' social networks and ties with the union at work which in turn increases their access to political resources, political awareness, and receptiveness to the union's call for political mobilization. Using a quasi-experimental design that institutes youth programs at some union work sites and not others, we test this hypothesis using a sample of young grocery store workers who are members of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW).

Political Ad Exposure, the Internet, and Participation: A Campaign Communication Mediation Model

Principal Investigators: Dhavan V. Shah and Douglas M. McLeod, University of Wisconsin, Madison

Political communication researchers have devoted a great deal of attention to the role of political advertising, the Internet and political discussion in civic and political life. In this paper, we integrate and extend this research by developing a Campaign Communication Mediation Model of civic and campaign participation. Two datasets are merged for this inquiry: (1) content-coded political ad-buy data on the placement of campaign messages on a market-by-market and program-by-program basis, and (2) a national panel study concerning patterns of traditional and digital media consumption and levels of civic and campaign participation. Exposure to televised campaign advertising is estimated by developing an algorithm based on the market and program placement of specific ads and geo-coded survey respondents' viewing of certain categories of television content in which these ads were concentrated. Structural equation models reveal that advertising exposure drives online news use in ways that complement conventional news influences on political discussion and political messaging. Campaign exposure emphasizing “attack” messages, however, appears to diminish information seeking motivations via broadcast and print media. These two forms of political expression, in turn, influence civic and political participation, and the direct and indirect effects of campaign advertising are generally positive. Other orderings of the variables are tested to compare our theorized model to alternative causal specifications. Results reveal that our models produce the best fit, empirically and theoretically. 

"Voter Mobilization by Absentee Ballot Recruitment"
Principal Investigator: Christopher B. Mann, Doctoral Candidate, Yale University

Colorado Conservation Voters Education Fund (CCVEF), a 501c3 organization, is conducting a voter turnout drive in the November 2005 election. The only statewide items on the ballot are two initiatives (Referenda C & D) known collectively as the Economic Recovery Act. CCVEF's voter turnout program targets low-propensity voters (voted in two or fewer of the last four even year elections) who have been identified as concerned about the environment. CCVEF targets low propensity voters of all ages. However, roughly one third of the low propensity universe is between 18-35 years old.

This experiment tests absentee voter recruitment as a method of increasing voter turnout. Part of the experiment will include mailing a piece to include two absentee ballot applications. The mail piece will be addressed to the name on the CCVEF list, unless there is more than one voter in a household on the list in which case it will addressed to multiple voters. The evaluation will test whether the inclusion of a second application creates a boost in turnout for individuals in a household other than those to whom the piece was addressed. CCVEF is interested in targeting all voters in a household since membership in environmental groups is often individual but other members of a household usually share environmental values. Past work by Gerber and Green, Nickerson, and others suggests that understanding the spillover effects of contacting (or attempting to contact) one member of a household can be quite important.

"Randomized Field Experiment in New Jersey and Virginia"
Principal Investigator: Tim Vercellotti, Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

The Eagleton Institute of Politics proposes creating a partnership with the New Jersey and Virginia branches of the Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) to evaluate the effects of two PIRG voter registration methods on voter turnout. We will evaluate the success of the two techniques using a randomized field experiment.

The two methods under investigation will be class raps and dorm door knocking . Class raps bring PIRG student volunteers into college and university classrooms to discuss the importance of voting with students and to register them to vote. In 2005, PIRG is conducting class raps on campuses in Virginia and New Jersey . Before conducting a class rap, PIRG volunteers request permission from the professor to visit their classes. As professors agree to this request, we will randomly assign classes to either a treatment or control group. Classes in the treatment groups will receive the standard PIRG class rap intervention. Classes in the control group will not receive a visit.

After the election, we will measure the difference in registration and turnout between treatment and control classes. This will allow us to assess the efficacy and cost-effectiveness of the class rap technique. In order to determine which students ultimately registered and voted, we will obtain class rosters for both treatment and control classes and compare them with voter lists that will be purchased after the election.

The goal of the Virginia experiment is to contact 2000 students in their classrooms before the registration deadline. In New Jersey , the target number of students is 2,500.

PIRG volunteers conduct dorm door knocking by visiting students in their dorm rooms and encouraging them to register and vote. For the second experiment, floors of dorms will be randomly assigned to either a treatment or control group. We are randomizing by floor instead of room to avoid contagion across rooms. In this case, registration and turnout will be measured by comparing university housing lists with statewide voter lists. The contact goal in Virginia is 1,500 students. The goal in NJ is 3,000 students.

"Young Democrats of America"
Principal Investigator: David W. Nickerson, University of Notre Dame

The Young Democrats of America are a partisan organization targeting young voters. They have agreed to participate in randomized experiments testing two of their mobilization tactics.

Experiment #1: Door-to-Door

The first experiment extends the familiar door-to-door voter mobilization experiments implemented by Gerber and Green (Gerber and Green 2000; Green, Gerber, and Nickerson 2003) by examining the timing, frequency, and content of the visit. It is well established that door-to-door canvassing can be effective at mobilizing young voters, but almost nothing is known about when or how often the visits should occur.

Experiment #2: Hangouts and Homes

The second experiment offers an exciting alternative to targeting young people from registered voter files at their doors. The problem in contacting voters is not responsiveness to blandishments to vote, it is making the contact in the first place (Nickerson – forthcoming in the Journal of Political Marketing ). An alternative strategy is to approach young people in the places where they congregate (i.e., let them come to you). The second experiment attempts to establish the efficacy of this model of voter mobilization.