This thesis examines the influence of religion on party realignment in the United States focusing on Catholic voting behavior. A statistical analysis utilizing bivariate analysis and logistical regressions examines if religion and party realignment is an ecumenical trend expanding beyond Evangelicals to Catholics. It measures scientifically the party trends of the Catholic voter. With data pooled from the National Election Studies from 1960 to 2004, it tests the hypothesis that church attending Catholics are realigning over time into the Republican Party both in vote choice and party identification, because of their pro-life position on abortion. The analysis shows that church attending Catholics have dealigned from the Democratic Party over time because of their pro-life position on abortion. The thesis is a model for examining the religion and party realignment question for other traditional Democratic religious denominations such as African-American Evangelicals and Jews.

State identification has been a more and more important issue in Taiwan since 1990.¡@This study applies focus group interview for the analysis of state identification.¡@Interviewers will progressive interpret the state identification of themselves through interaction in a small group by focus group interview. Accordingly, the facts on affecting Taiwanese in state identification can be exposed, and outwards of state identification of Taiwanese can be further explored. ¡@¡@According to the findings of the study, party identification can drive state identification for Taiwanese, especially for those who have strong emotion in party identification. And their position of state identification is usually consistent with that of their identified party. Meanwhile, as for a Taiwanese who has weak emotion in party identification, age, provincial, background, and growing experience are the main factors that affect state identification. Moreover, concerning the symbol of the state, Taiwanese have different preferences and selections in parties and the name of the state. However, once the symbol of the state appears in an international occasion, national identification can drive a Taiwanese to generate a certain degree of emotion that connects with the symbol of the state. ¡@¡@Finally, this study further discovers that Taiwanese confuse the concept of national identification with that of state identification. The concept of national identification has always been used to discuss issues about Taiwan, and therefore Taiwanese are unaware of using national identification to discuss state identification.

The purpose of the study is to investigate the relationship between the variables of the personal and social background and ethnic identity, party identification, evaluation to the candidates, and election issues of the voters and their voting choice in Taipei Mayor Election of 2006. The study uses the information of the large interview, which comes from a four-year-research(2005-2008) of `Taiwan Election and Democratization` held by professor Ji Huang and released by the Election Research Center of National Cheng-Chi University, of 2006 Taipei and Kaohsiung Mayor Elections. Through the research and analysis, the study hopes to establish the voting model of Taipei voters and be a reference and supplement for future researches. First of all, by viewing the relationship between personal and social background of the voters and the four intermediary variables (ethnic identity, party identification, evaluation of candidates, and the election issues), we found that there is highly interpretative ability between provincial and the four intermediary variables. And the genders, ages, and education level have considerable interpretative ability, but the home income doesn¡¦t. Secondly, from the relationship among the four intermediary variables and the voting tendency, the study also found that the four variables intermediary variables have considerable high interpretation ability to interpret the voting tendency of Taipei voters, and ethnic identity and political parties are the most. Finally, the study analysis the voters personal and social background together with the four intermediaries and found that the two intermediary variables of ethnic identity and political parties are more significant to influence the voting tendency of voters. Therefore, the four intermediary variables which the study used are very good research variables, and they can be continually used to research the voting behavior of Taipei voters in the future.

Election is the fundamental system to maintain one¡¦s political leadership a democratic country.Election will decide the development of political system and fulfill the spirit of democracy.This is a study about Kaohsiung City mayor voter votes factor of the choice in the 2002 and 2006 Election. The results of the research are as follows:-- 1. In 2002, there are three causes that make a voter to change his decision in choosing a candidate. They are the age of a voter, the education level of the voter, and his personal racial group in the society. These three causes influence a voter¡¦s recognition of another racial group in the society, his stand on the problem of Taiwan being united or divided from one China, his point of view on how much support a candidate will get from his party and other parties, a voter¡¦s evaluation of a candidate¡¦s behavior and conduct. We found that the difference between a voter and another voter shows very distinct or extremely distinct in making a decision.In 2006, there are two causes that make a voter to change his mind in choosing a candidate. They are the education level of the voter, and his personal racial group in the society. These two causes influence a voter¡¦s recognition of another racial group, his stand on the problem of Taiwan being united or divided from China, his point of view on how much support a candidate will get from his party and other parties, a voter¡¦s evaluation of a candidate¡¦s behavior and conduct. We found that the difference between voters and voters showed very distinct different or extremely distinct different in making a decision.Briefly speaking, a voter¡¦s individual personality and his living social background, are the reasons that really related to his stand on the problem of Taiwan being separated from China or not. And we found that a voter¡¦s personality related to his stand point on the problem of Taiwan being separated or not from one China, apparently influence a voter¡¦s decision more in the election of 2002 than in that of 2006. 2. Both in the study of the election in 2002 and 2006, we found it made no difference in making a choice of a candidate if the voter is female or male. The result does not achieve the standard of difference level(P¡Ö00.5). . Besides the voters¡¦ age related to the choice of a candidate appeared ¡§rather difference¡¨, the voters¡¦ personal education level, their racial group, and their income, with their individual social background were the reasons that influenced a voter¡¦s decision when making a choice of a candidate. These reasons related to a voter¡¦s decision ¡§appear apparently different and extremely different.¡¨ 3. In the research of both the election in 2002 and in 2006, except that people¡¦s evaluation of Huang Tian-Shang related to the voters¡¦ decision of making a choice, did not apparently achieve the standard of difference level (P¡Ö00.5), that is, except that the variety factors related to the voters¡¦ decision , did not appear apparently difference level , other variety factors related to the voters¡¦ decision in making a choice, ¡§apparently appeared difference level .¡¨

This research attempts to find out the possible reasons which affect to the polling supports of pan-blue and pan-green¡¦s presidential candidates by first-order autoregressive model since May 20th 2000 to March 22nd 2008. We explore the effect of these factors and how the factors to affect the degree of both candidates¡¦ supports. We try to explain the fluctuating of both sides¡¦ degree. To exploring the change of the polling supports and degree, this research collects many significant events during the said period. We view the degree of each category¡¦s effect by sorting out government¡¦s policy, economy, ideologies of independence and unification, the personal issues of candidates, parties¡¦ issue and others to explain the reasons of polling supports¡¦ change in addition I add the effect of media organ, candidates nominating or not, the difference of each election, and the time effect. From the results of this research, the effect of media positions for polling outcomes is not significant, but the candidates nominating or not and the difference of each election affect to pan-blue¡¦s supports and both sides¡¦ degree. Besides, the issue of ideologies of independence and unification influences to pan-blue and pan-green¡¦s candidates, but the candidates personal issues affects the change of the both sides¡¦ degree. When the events of government policy and ideologies of independence and unification are happened more nearly at the polling time, the effect to the change of the polling supports will be greater.

<p>This dissertation proposes that party identification, as a social identity, fundamentally alters individual processing of and reactions to political information and events. I present a <italic>party identity linkage theory</italic> in which I argue party identity can lead to heightened, specific emotional responses to threatening political competition and biased, polarized perceptions of politicalized objects if the link between self and party is sufficiently strong. Because people are strongly motivated to protect the positive perceptions they have of themselves, they should be motivated to maintain and protect their positive perceptions of groups that are linked to their self-concept through social identities. Furthermore, because people tend to engage in self-serving biases that result in a degree of positive illusions about themselves, especially when the positive self-view is threatened, evaluations of closely linked groups should also be subject to a degree of positive bias, especially when the positive image of the group is threatened. Drawing on both experimental and survey data, I provide evidence that strong partisans are fundamentally different from weak partisans and independents in the degree a party is included in their self-concepts, in their responses to candidates' changed party status, and in their responses to threatening inter-party competition.</p> / Dissertation

This thesis addresses the omission in the literature of how political context influences the performance of informational shortcuts. In line with this research gap, the first article suggests that parliamentarian and party-oriented systems encourage the performance of ideology, party identification and leadership, as their use increases the probability to participate in elections, while the effective number of parties has no impact. The second article focus on Spain and two contextual shortcuts - incumbency and electoral polls-. The findings indicate that peripheral voters has the highest propensity to vote for left wing parties when the polls show that the left party is going to win the elections and it is the challenger in salient elections or the incumbent in a nonsalient election. The third article analyses the Spanish case and the impact of leader evaluations and ideology on vote choice over time. The findings manifest that while ideology becomes more important, the utility of leader evaluation is reduced once the informational context becomes more fruitful and stable. / Esta tesis aborda la omisión en la literatura de cómo el contexto político influye en el funcionamiento de los atajos informativos. En línea con esta limitación en la literatura, el primer artículo examina qué instituciones promueven un mejor funcionamiento de la ideología, la identificación partidista y el liderazgo, midiendo los efectos de su uso en la probabilidad de participar en las elecciones. La evidencia muestra como los sistemas parlamentarios y los sistemas orientados a partidos promueven un mejor funcionamiento de los tres atajos, mientras que el número efectivo de partidos no tiene impacto. El segundo artículo se basa en España y dos atajos contextuales –estar en el gobierno y los sondeos electorales- para explorar el saber convencional de que un mayor porcentaje de voto beneficia a los partidos de izquierdas. La evidencia indica que los votantes periféricos tienen la mayor probabilidad de votar a partidos de izquierdas cuando en elecciones relevantes los sondeos muestran que el partido de izquierdas va a ganar las elecciones y está en la oposición o cuando está en el gobierno en elecciones no importantes. El tercer artículo analiza el caso español y el impacto de las evaluaciones de los líderes y la ideología en el voto a través del tiempo. Los resultados manifiestan que, si bien la ideología se vuelve más importante, la utilidad de la evaluación el líder se reduce una vez que el contexto informativo se vuelve más rico y estable.

This Master's thesis looks into the phenomenon of party identification and explores various factors that play a role in the emergence, development and decline of partisanship. It follows and compares the changing levels of party identification in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands from the 1960s to the present day and strives to determine the causes and effects of this process. It is widely accepted that declining party identification is linked to increasing electoral volatility. This thesis draws upon a range of range of theoretical works in the field of electoral behaviour. It utilizes findings of an original small scale research among the British and Dutch voters as well as established election studies.

The first Black American president ran for re-election in the 2012 election, which saw record-breaking voter turnout. After this election, scholars sought to examine what social identities impacted voter turnout and, found that non-Hispanic Black voters played a critical role in shaping President Obama’s success. Although the effects of social identities on voter turnout are the focus of an extensive body of existing research, many scholars study the separate effects of characteristics, such as race/ethnicity, gender or party identification. Utilizing public opinion data from the 2016 General Survey Study (GSS), this paper seeks to examine the intersectional effects of race, ethnicity, and gender on voter turnout in the 2012 Presidential Election. The findings of this can assist in understanding the impact these social identities had on turnout for non-Hispanic Black women in the 2012 presidential election and provide a basis for studying these intersecting factors in succeeding elections.

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