(2012):
Das Internet als Wahlkampfinstrument.
[Akademiekonferenz “Internet & Partizipation”, Universität Hamburg, 30/11/2012 - 30/11/2012].
More
Election Study Baden-Württemberg 2011
Project Directors
Prof. Dr. Thorsten Faas
Project Staff
Johannes N. Blumenberg
Juniorprofessorenprogramm des Landes Baden-Württemberg-funded
2010 – 2012
Research question/goal:
The study investigated processes of public opinion formation and decision making in the run-up to the election in the German state of Baden-Württemberg in 2011. The study was based on a new and innovative design that was used for the first time ever in Germany – a rolling panel study. The rolling panel study combines the advantages of rolling cross-section designs with those of classic panel designs. In the course of our study (from November 2010 until May 2011), a total of 17,000 interviews were conducted online spanning over a total of five panel waves, three of them “rolling”. Implementing such a rolling panel, it becomes possible to scrutinize aggregate changes of attitudes and behavioral intentions on a day-by-day basis, as is the case for rolling cross-section studies. But the design also allows analyzing individual changes and their causes – typical features of panel studies.
Given the special circumstances of the state election and its preceding campaign (that was characterized by a number of extraordinary events, among them “Stuttgart 21” and the nuclear catastrophe in Fukushima), the new design was put to a critical test and proved its applicability. The campaign events left visible marks in the collected data and – as a consequence – the (dynamic) processes of public opinion formation and decision making could be analyzed in great detail, applying state-of-the-art theories from the fields of political communication and political psychology.
In a nutshell, the contributions of our study are twofold: On the one hand we were able to develop and successfully implement a new study design. On the other hand (and based on the methodological innovation), we were able to gain new insights into campaign dynamics in the run-up to state elections.
Publications
Presentations
-
-
(2012): Scrutinizing Dynamics: Rolling panel waves in theory and practice. [GOR 2012, Mannheim, 04/03/2012 - 06/03/2012]. More
-
(2011): Stuttgart 21 and the Baden-Württemberg state election 2011: Emotions, Attitudes, and Results. [37th IASGP Annual Conference, London, 15/05/2011 - 16/05/2011]. More
-
(2011): Die Vermessung der Dynamik. Theorie und Technik des Rolling-Cross-Section-Panels der Wahlstudie Baden-Württemberg 2011. [Gemeinsame Tagung des Arbeitskreises Methoden der DVPW und Sektion Methoden der Empirischen Sozialforschung der DGS, Mannheim, 26/05/2011 - 27/05/2011]. More
-
(2011): Happy respondents, happy researchers? What self-disclosure and response-style can tell us about the quality of our data. [4th ESRA Annual Conference, Lausanne, 17/07/2011 - 21/07/2011]. More
-
(2011): The Glory of the Past and the Sadness of Nowadays: The Difficult Relationship between Social Democratic Parties and their Voters. [APSA 2011 Annual Meeting, Seattle, 31/08/2011 - 03/09/2011]. More
-
(2011): A Matter of Choice: Rethinking the Concept of Party Identification in Multi-Party Systems. [APSA 2011 Annual Meeting, Seattle, 31/08/2011 - 03/09/2011]. More
-
(2011): Warum wählen freie Wähler die Freien Wähler? - Die Wahrnehmung durch die Wahlberechtigten. [Parteienwissenschaftliches Symposion 2011 des PruF, Düsseldorf, 07/04/2011 - 08/04/2011]. More
-
(2011): Die Vermessung der Dynamik: Eine rollierende Panelstudie im Vorfeld der baden-württembergischen Landtagswahl 2011. [Jahrestagung des Arbeitskreises Wahl- und Einstellungsforschung der DVPW, Mainz, 29/06/2011 - 30/06/2011]. More